‘Very brave' man's quick thinking helps him avoid death by polar bear: video

New York Post

29-04-2025

Sometimes you eat the bear, sometimes the bear eats you – unless you run really fast.
A Norwegian worker narrowly avoided being a polar bear's dinner in a wild recent encounter caught on video.
The man is seen in the footage first firing off a round from his rifle to try to warn the bear off from the Arctic town of Pyramiden.
3 A Norwegian man narrowly avoided being a polar bear's dinner in a wild recent encounter caught on video.
Rebecca Baack via Storyful
The ploy doesn't work, and the polar bear, whose species can reach speeds of 25 mph, gives chase.
The man then tosses his rifle and sprints toward a nearby snowmobile, bear-ly escaping with his life as he speeds away.
The polar bear, realizing his prey got away, squats in the snow.
'Very brave guy!' a person says off-camera in the video, while another adds, 'Damn, that guy is brave!'
The incident took place on the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard.
3 The man decided to drop his gun and tried to outrun a charging polar bear on a snowmobile in the Arctic town of Pyramiden on the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard.
Rebecca Baack via Storyful
Rebecca Baack captured the dramatic video while staying at a nearby hotel during a ski expedition.
'I was woken up around midnight with someone saying there was a bear. A staff member was trying to scare it away when the bear charged him,' Baack told Yahoo News.
According to Visit Svalbard, a tourism agency, polar bears are known to populate the region, and it warns visitors to be prepared to encounter the fearsome animal anytime, anywhere.
3 The polar bear couldn't catch up to the man escaping in his snowmobile and squats in the snow.
Rebecca Baack via Storyful
Polar bears attack 'quickly, without warning,' the site says, encouraging tourists to be accompanied by an armed local guide when leaving settlements.
Although rare, polar bears attacks occur.
In December, The Post reported on a Canadian man who heroically lunged at a polar bear attacking his wife in rural Ontario.
The couple was looking for their pet dogs at the time.
A neighbor arrived with a gun and shot the bear several times, killing it.
In August, a pair of the bears also mauled a worker to death at a remote site in the Canadian Arctic.