A polar bear killed two people in Alaska on Tuesday after it entered a community and chased multiple residents, Alaska State Troopers said.
The troopers said in a post on the state Department of Public Safety website that the bear fatally attacked an adult woman and boy at the same time a local resident was able to shoot and kill it. The incident occurred in the town of Wales on the Seward Peninsula, which is located in the western part of the state next to the Bering Strait.
State troopers first received a report of an attack at 2:30 p.m. local time.
The post states that troopers and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game are traveling to Wales as weather conditions allow, and the next of kin of the two people killed are in the process of being notified.
The Anchorage Daily News reported that fatal polar bear attacks are rare in Alaska. One killed a man in the village of Point Lay in 1990, and biologists said the bear showed signs of starvation.
Sightings of polar bears in the region of the Bering Strait are also uncommon, but it has happened, the outlet reported. They can be seen as far south as St. Lawrence Island, located in the Bering Strait, or farther during the winter, according to the state fish and game department.
