Survivor tells the attack of a grizzly bear in northwestern Montana | State and region

Broste was teaching a friend to hunt north of Columbia Falls last November when he stumbled across a grizzly bear lying under a fallen tree about 15 feet away, Montana Public Radio reported.

"It was just for me to move in. They talk about fighting or flight, and of course, I did not even feel like my body was starting to get away from it." Where this bear came from, but also in my mind As in one case, this is about to happen and you can not do anything to stop it, so wait, "he says.

Broste just had time to stick his rifle between him and the bear.

"I think that he just touched the shoulder and that, for example, I was knocked over or stumbled, I fell back, but the next thing that I knew, the bear was on me.He bit me the right arm, you know those shaking movements, like shaking, distorting, disabling movements. I really heard the click, the creaks, the sound of my bones, or something else.

"And then he went over my left leg, just above my ankle, and somehow he shook me a bit and then the last bite was on the end of my boot. It was a bit downhill from me and actually it seems really strange to me, but there was a moment when the bear pulled on my boot and my heel started to slip, and for some reason, I was afraid of losing my boots, all that's going on, and I'm like, "Oh man, I'm about to lose my boot." Then he just dropped my foot and I And the last thing I can remember is that fat brown fur ass escaping and it was great, "he says.

Broste shouted for his fighter friend, who had heard nothing and was surprised to find his friend torn apart. They fired a few shots to scare the bear, then called 911. This call sent alerts to Brian Somers and Joe Bergman.

"I'm calling Brian Somers, I'm a judicial investigator for Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks," he says.

"I'm calling Joe Bergman and I'm an orthopedic surgeon at Flathead Orthopedics, but I also have a special interest in treating trauma and mutilations of bears," he says.

Sommers, along with FWP, arrived at the scene of the attack north of Columbia Falls just as Broste was embarking on a medical helicopter.

"So we had to wait for everyone to be loaded into the helicopter that took off, then we went in and started processing the scene," said Sommers.

Sommers leads the Wildlife-Human Attack Team, or WHART, to ensure a systematic approach to investigations of bear and other wildlife attacks. His final report helps FWP decide what to do with the attacking animal. It could be used in court for offenses under the Endangered Species Act or any other litigation, or to rebut a false account.

The team includes five members: Forensic Investigator Sommers, a wildlife biologist and three security guards in case of return of the animal.

While the guards were monitoring the area, Brian Sommers went to the scene. He found the log where the bear had taken a nap and Broste's trace through the scrub.

"This bear is lying there, hears a noise, looks up, sees it and says," Wow, it's too close, "and draws a straight line for Anders. knocking, he flips it upside down, the scratches in the snow where his backpack and his body were pushed, "says Sommers.

Sommers photographed everything and then looked for evidence.

"Hair, saliva, anything we can find will tell us who our offending animal is," he says.

While Sommers understood the moments that preceded the Broste attack, Dr. Joe Bergman was in the Kalispell emergency room assessing Broste's wounds: a dislocated right hand, ligaments torn at left knee and hands and feet smeared with bite marks. While Bergman was examining Broste's wounds, he was also looking for something microscopic and insidious.

"The sting of a grizzly bear – basically, they will bite into your tissues, then will lift up and then let go – so that the wound superficially looks like a puncture wound.So this is not very serious, while in fact, they've separated a large area of ​​deep tissue, which is now contaminated with all that bacteria, "he says.

Bergman says that bear teeth act like hypodermic needles. They can inject a multitude of bacteria deep into the tissues.

"Gaseous gangrene, or Clostridium, for example, is one of the bacteria present in the mouth of the bear.One of these most aggressive infections can be a threat to life or the death of a member, "he says.

Dr. Larry Iwersen, Bergman's mentor at Kalispell Regional Healthcare, is worried about these specific insects to bear. In 1992, he joined Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks to test the mouth of the bear and create a cocktail of antibiotics to give bite victims. arrived at the emergency. Bergman says that Iwersen again analyzed the sample in 2013 to update his cocktail.

"We started seeing more drug-resistant bacteria like methicillin-resistant streptococci and staphylococcal species, so we had to add another antibiotic, vancomycin, to cover these bacteria. 39. Waterborne So, if they have eaten fish or been in rivers, things like pseudomonas that require a different antibiotic called zoocin to treat, so this is a broad spectrum that covers the majority of these organisms, "explains Bergman.

When a patient like Broste arrives, Bergman immediately installs an intravenous dose of the cocktail of antibiotics. While a trauma team stabilizes the patient, Bergman sweeps their wounds to detect the bacteria that the cocktail does not cover and surgically cleans the cuts and nicks.

"The first day, it takes a lot of time – just look at all the different bite wounds and manage them to clean up all debris to prevent infection," he says.

He is also looking for evidence to share with Fish, Wildlife and Parks.

"We take a lot of measurements, lots of pictures to see how many bites he has, measure the width of the teeth so that the guys at Fish, Wildlife and Parks can correlate with any grizzly bear in which they might be involved. attack, "says Bergman.

FWP investigator Brian Sommers followed the bear who attacked Broste but did not find him, which he says is quite common in surprise encounters like Broste's. Later, he would send his samples of evidence to a laboratory in British Columbia to identify the species, and in some cases even the exact animal, if the investigators had the DNA of previous encounters with this bear.

Sommers also visited Broste at the hospital to question him about what had happened and see if the Broste story matched what he had restored from from the scene. Sommers says that the stories of victims can go into details.

"Injuries treat people's brains differently. So, some people remember, hey, that was the first bite. It was the second bite. It was the third. It was the last one. And others might be like, it was the last bite. I do not remember any of those in between.

"It's like everything's fine, it's not a big deal, you know, because everyone is treating it differently, and some people say," Yeah, I remember it. " bear who attacked me. That's all I remember. "It's just like that, you have to catch him off guard and do it and try to try, hopefully, to have enough evidence and other places to put everything together," Sommers said.

He continues to urge victims, their families and witnesses to seek post-traumatic stress counseling to treat mental injuries.

"I think it's the nature of being human, it's that we all deal with different things.We treat things differently," Sommers said.

After seven days in the hospital and a few months of physical therapy, Anders Broste is healing. He and Sommers both stated that he could hardly have done otherwise to prevent the attack. But he plans to launch a space cover and a personal satellite tracker in his bag during his next outing.

"In northwestern Montana, we live on the edge of the wilderness," says Broste. "So, I can perfectly tell you that it's what you want when you're in pain.You can get help.But recreate yourself.Sake out.It's the best part.I have look forward to going out. "

Next time he will also have a bear spray.