A pair of Northwest College wrestlers are lucky to be alive after tussling with a massive grizzly bear in the woods near Cody, Wyoming, during a weekend hunting trip.
The group of four teammates had finished antler hunting and had broken into two groups heading towards their vehicles when wrestler Brady Lowry noticed bear feces in the trail.
“I saw bear crap all over, and I looked at Kenny and said, ‘There is a grizzly bear here,” Lowry told KSL-TV, referring to teammate Kendell Cummings who had stayed back with him to search for more shedded antlers. “And right after I said that, the bear came out of the willows. It was thick. It came at me and charged me and tackled me off this cliff into this gully and was going at me for a little bit.”
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The bear then chomped Lowry’s arm, breaking it immediately. His teammate Cummings then used his wrestling skills to attack the bear, he told KSL-TV. He said he kicked the bear, pulled its fur, and tried to distract it before it released Lowry and started chasing him. “It tackled me, chewed me up a bit, and then when it was done, it wandered off, and I started calling out for Brady to make sure he was alright,” Cummings told the TV station from the hospital.
Lowry, who was able to get back up, then ran to find the other teammates who were ahead of them. They called 911 and returned to search for Cummings, only to realize the bear had come back for a second attack.
“We heard Kenny yell, and he came out of the trees where the bear was at and was covered in blood. He walked down to us. Gus ran up to him, and we were probably five miles from the trailhead where we parked and about a mile to the bottom of the hill,” he said, referring to August Harrison.
Cummings, who was clearly lucky to have survived both attacks, described the horrific ordeal to KSL-TV. “The bear circled back around, and it got me again, chewed on me, and that’s when it got my head and cheek,” Cummings said. “And then it went away again for whatever reason.”
A local hunter then helped the young men to the trailhead where they were met by first responders. Cummings was transported to a hospital in Billings, Montana, by helicopter, and Lowry was taken by ambulance.
Wyoming Game & Fish Department, which monitors bears in the area, confirmed the attack in a press release and warned there were many bears in the area, describing the attack on the wrestlers as a “sudden, surprise” encounter with a grizzly bear. “In the vicinity where the attack occurred, reports from landowners and hunters indicate there may be six to 10 different bears moving between agricultural fields and low elevation slopes,” spokesman Dan Smith said. “Game and Fish will continue to monitor bear activity in the area and work with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to make management decisions in the best interest of public safety.”
It is not clear if the bear will be euthanized once identified.
The two injured wrestlers will sit out the rest of the season, coach Jim Zeigler told Fox news. “There’s real serious puncture holes and wounds,” he said, referring to Cummings’ facial wounds. “He took a lot of staples to his head and also some cosmetic surgery for his cheek.”
