A Minnesota woman staying with her parents on an island in a remote part of Canada was killed by a black bear in an attack that experts say is “extremely rare.”
Catherine Sweatt-Mueller, 62, was at her parents’ cabin on Red Pine Island in Rainy Lake, located near the border of Canada and Minnesota, when she went outside Sunday and never came back. A police spokesman said Sweatt-Mueller had heard her dogs barking and went to see what was going on.
When the two dogs, one of them injured, returned to the cabin without Sweatt-Mueller, her parents called the authorities. Officers found the bear standing over the deceased woman’s body and shot it dead.
“Attacks of this nature are extremely rare, and our hearts go out to the family and friends of the victim,” said a spokesman for the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry.
Black bears differ from brown bears in that they are not typically aggressive around humans. In fact, upon seeing people black bears can become frightened and flee. When people encounter black bears in the wild, they’re encouraged to make loud noises like yell in order to try and scare it off.
“They’re very unaggressive bears. If you ever approach a black bear closely, typically they’ll see you and run off,” said Dave Garshelis, a researcher with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources.
The bear behind the unusual attack is being sent to the University of Guelph for testing to determine if there were any physical reasons for the strange behavior. The last time a bear killed someone in Ontario was nearly 15 years ago.
