Fat Bear Week Contest 2024: Deadly attack causes a stir

CNN
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The schedule for the 2024 Fat Bear Week competition was announced Tuesday evening, but only after a deadly bear-on-bear attack in Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska on Monday delayed the unveiling.

Public voting in the annual Fat Bear competition has become a true fall ritual and is scheduled to begin on Wednesday at noon ET. The popular competition is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year – but is a stark reminder that in the wilds of southern Alaska near Katmai, the strict laws of nature always apply.

Members of the public can vote online for their favorite Bear candidates, and voting runs until October 8th. A winner will also be announced that evening. The first duel takes place between bear 519, an adolescent female with “gray brown fur, high upright ears and lanky legs,” and 909 Junior, an almost four-year-old female with wide-set ears.

Katmai said on its website that nearly 1.4 million votes were cast for the bears from more than 100 countries in the 2023 contest, which was won by a defensive mother bear named 128 Grazer.

Anyone who has ever joined a March Madness betting pool for the NCAA basketball tournament will be familiar with the competition's bracket competition.

In this single-elimination format, the Bears fight for votes in direct duels every day. The bear that collects the most online votes advances to the next round.

Are you ready to vote for your favorite fattened bear? Cast your vote at fatbearweek.org.

A preliminary round has already been held for Fat Bear Junior, with Bear 909 Jr. taking top spot.

Each year, bears gather at Brooks Falls in Katmai and downstream on the Brooks River to feast on salmon and fatten up before their long and arduous hibernation. The public can follow the fishing expeditions on live cams on Explore.org, making for a fascinating sight.

But people watching Monday might have gotten more than they bargained for when Bear No. 469, a male, approached, attacked and ultimately killed Bear No. 402, a female nearly as large, in the Brooks River .

That attack delayed the brackets' release for a day while park and competition officials regrouped.

The National Park Service and Explore.Org posted an edited version of the footage along with commentary on YouTube.

In video commentary, experts were unsure what caused the attack but said it was unusual. No. 402 tries to escape the predatory male bear, but can't. Experts said they believe she died by drowning.

“We love the bears, but it's also a stark reminder of how big, strong and powerful these animals really are,” Mike Fitz, Explore.org's resident naturalist, said in the commentary. “402 is a beloved bear by every single one of us, and honestly I think we're all a little speechless. … It’s really hard to see.”

There have also been some problematic human-bear interactions along the Brooks River in recent weeks.

According to a separate NPS news release, Katmai National Park staff witnessed four incidents of bears receiving fish from anglers between Sept. 18 and 29.

This has resulted in the Brooks River corridor being closed to all but subsistence anglers below Brooks Falls until October 31, unless the park superintendent lifts the order sooner.

Bears that receive food from humans may lose their fear of humans, creating a potentially dangerous situation for both, NPS said.