Alaska parkrangers fail to have powerful enough rifles to deal with black bear who mauls 16-year-old runner to death

State park staffers were scouring the area Monday looking for the bear, state Fish and Game spokesman Ken Marsh said. Sunday’s attack was believed to have been a rare predatory move, not a defensive action such as when a female bear will protect her cubs, he said.

“It’s very unusual,” Marsh said of the mauling. “It’s sort of like someone being struck by lightning.”

Later Monday, a second fatal mauling at the hands of a black bear was reported nearly 300 miles northeast of Anchorage. Officials with an underground gold mine reported a contract employee hired to take geological samples was killed and another injured in a black bear attack.

No names have been released. Alaska State Troopers and federal mine officials are investigating the mauling at Pogo Mine.

The last fatal mauling in the state occurred near Delta Junction in Alaska’s interior in 2013, when a man was killed by a male black bear, Marsh said. The last fatal bear attack in the greater Anchorage area was in 1995, when two people were killed in the Turnagain Arm area by a brown bear protecting a moose carcass, he said.

Areas where wilderness races such as Sunday’s take place are inherently risky when it comes to bear encounters, Precosky said. Competitors in the Bird Ridge race sign a liability waiver as part of the registration process.

But competitors often train alone in such areas and are fully aware of the dangers. Races actually can be said to cut down on the risk of a bear encounter because so many people are there, making noise and making their presence known, Precosky said. “There’s no safer time to be on a mountain than on a race,” he said.