Polar bear mauls teen to death

A BRITISH teenager has been killed by a polar bear that injured four other people in a tour group that had been camping at a remote Norwegian beauty spot.
The tourists killed the animal after it attacked while apparently looking for food on the Von Postbreen glacier on the island of Spitsbergen, part of the Svalbard archipelago.
Horatio Chapple, 17, was on a trip organised by the British Schools Exploring Society, founded in 1932 ''to provide young people with an intense and lasting experience of self-discovery in some of the world's last true wilderness environments around today''.
''Horatio was a fine young man hoping to go on to read medicine after school,'' the London-based group's chairman, Edward Watson, said.
His friends, Patrick Flinders, 16, and Scott Smith, 17, were injured fighting off the bear, as were the expedition guides, Michael Reid, 29, and Andrew Ruck, 27.
Patrick is said to have punched the bear on the nose before it was shot dead by other members of the group.
The injured tourists alerted authorities by satellite phone and were airlifted by helicopter to hospital 40 kilometres away in Longyearbyen, the island's capital.
According to local media, the group was attacked while still in their tents.
Liv Asta Odegaard, a spokeswoman for the governor of Svalbard, said: ''We got a call via satellite phone from a British group of campers that there had been a polar bear attack and that one person was dead and that others were injured and they needed assistance.
''There are no roads in the area of the Von Postbreen glacier where the incident happened so we scrambled a helicopter.''
She described the survivors' injuries as ''extremely serious''.
The rugged glacial island attracts tourists in the summer months because of its spectacular midnight sun and views of the northern lights.
However, earlier this year, the Svalbard governor issued a warning about polar bears after several were seen close to Longyearbyen.
The tragedy happened just days after the expedition's participants said in a blog post how excited they were about seeing polar bears on their trip.
Attacks are not uncommon, and according to unique warning signs it is illegal to leave a human settlement without carrying a gun.
People who spotted bears were asked to telephone a special number.
Dwindling sea ice in recent years has led to polar bears, which usually hunt seals, looking inland for food, including eggs from the nests of barnacle geese on the island.

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• Polar
• bear
• mauls
• teen
• to
• death
• BRITISH
• teenager
• bears

[postalada1]

I am a polar bear and I am looking good.

I'm living on the icecaps like I know I should.

I never liked tourists cos I am doing fine.

Stay away from my Cubs or I'll lose my mind....

"Oh no some tourists on my rock again.

I think i'll tear their heads off like for a game.

I'll take a piece of meat home: i think It's understood.

Cos my cubs say camper's flesh it really tastes so good...."

[zaqura1001]

@postalada1

GREAT

I like it

[gartnavel89]

I'm sorry, but I have no sympathy for privileged public schoolboys who get their highs dicking around with apex predators.

[Dosalt]

leave the bears alone it's their habitat. I can't imagine someone retarded enough to walk into polarbear's habitat and shooting them down, what good will that do

[EllieLrA]

The expedition set out to HELP and survey the enviroment so we could understand it and possibly help save it from US. Not to purposely kill a polar bear. They wanted to do anything but that. And I will finish by saying that they dont yet know that the trip wire was not working, the bear may have crossed it willingly because it's stomach was found empty. Stop making judgements, they had every right to go there.

[solobackpacking]

so the bear pays the ultimate price for a bunch of incomoetent tour guides.

[controllerbrain]

It's pretty clear what went wrong with the tripwire - they didn't have one set up. That exploration group needs to man up and admit it. Dickheads.

[environmentinfocus]

• YES YES THE The 16-year-old's friend Horatio Chapple was killed, but what do you think happened to the polar bear? It was also killed. Did the bear deserve it ? No it didn’t. The boy was wrong to enter the bear’s territory. How would you react if a stranger walked into your home and start to poke around, you'd be angry and that’s what the polar bear got – angry.

•

• REST IN PEACE POLAR BEAR, REST IN PEACE.

•

• environmentinfocus com

[dankhan69]

If only there was a sharpshooting Norwegian man nearby.....

[dhide14]

I'd love to see the giant turd that polar bear shit out