Alaska hunter survives bear attack

ANCHORAGE, Alaska — A hunter kneeling over the carcass of a young grizzly bear he had just killed was mauled by a larger grizzly that charged him from its den.

Lynn Keogh, 42, of Anchorage, was treated and released from a hospital after the attack Friday. He suffered a broken hand and bite wounds in the mauling before his hunting partner shot and killed the grizzly.

Keogh, a hunting and fishing guide, and friend Ray Bendixen had driven to Keogh's cabin near Eureka northwest of Fairbanks on Friday and drove snowmobiles north 60 to 70 miles to the Oshetna River valley.

They spotted a den on a hillside and a small bear moving in and out of it. After five hours, Keogh shot the bear. The hunters waited to make sure the bear was dead, then talked for about five more minutes when they reached the carcass.

No tracks indicated another bear might be present. But then the second bear charged out of the den, a hole about 24 inches wide in the hillside, straight for Keogh.

He managed to hit the bear with a shot from his rifle, but it still bit him up and down his body.

"The shot that I got into the bear was more than likely a mortal wound, but it wasn't going to do it fast enough," Keogh said Tuesday.

Keogh said he felt the grizzly clamp down on his head and let go. Then Bendixen dropped the bear with a shot from his rifle from between 20 and 30 feet away.

"I heard a shot," Keogh said. "I don't know if I heard it or felt the shot hit the bear," but suddenly the bear was dead, slumped on top of him.

The smaller bear, which he estimated to be about 6 feet tall, turned out to be a 3-year-old, legal to be killed. The older bear, a sow at 6 1/2 to 7 feet tall, may have been its mother.