A 10-year-old boy was mauled by a 250-pound black bear in Morris, Conn., Sunday but survived and was recovering as of Monday afternoon.
According to a statement provided to USA Today by the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, the boy was attacked at 11 a.m. Sunday at his grandparents’ home in the western part of Connecticut.
“Black bear attacks on humans are exceptionally rare,” according to the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. However, they are sometimes attracted to food or garbage, the department added.
People who live in an area that might have bears are advised not to feed them both in Connecticut and in California, where there is also a black bear population. Earlier this year, the Republican-American of Waterbury reported that residents of northwestern Connecticut were seeing more of the bears than usual.
James Butler, the grandfather of the boy injured by a bear this weekend, told the outlet that “his grandson was playing near a trampoline when the bear emerged from thick woods behind the house.”
“I heard him yell ‘bear’ and when I looked up, I saw his leg in the bear’s mouth and the bear trying to drag him across the lawn,” Butler said.
Butler, who uses a wheelchair, threw a metal bar at the animal’s head and it released the boy. However, it grabbed him a second time before a neighbor also heard the boy’s screams and scared off the bear by screaming and waving a metal pipe.
It had used it’s “claws to try to roll the boy onto his back,” Butler told the Republican-American. Even after the two were safely inside their home, the bear climbed up Butler’s wheelchair ramp and peered in their window. Connecticut Environmental Conservation Police euthanized the bear, which was still near the scene when emergency responders arrived.
Officials cited by USA Today said that the boy’s injuries – which Butler said include a thigh puncture wound, bite marks and claw marks – do not appear to be life-threatening. He was transported to a hospital soon after the incident.
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