Sunday morning hike takes a bizarre and terrifying turn.
On Sunday morning, a 69-year-old Japanese man was on Iwakamiyama, a mountain in Iwate Prefecture. With a layer of snow still on the ground, the man and his female companion had unintentionally wandered off of the hiking trail, and were trying to find their way back to it.
Being off course on a winter hike can be very dangerous, as it becomes difficult to see whether or not there’s secure footing where you’re walking. Sure enough, the man ended up stepping into a hole that was hidden by the snow. Fortunately, he only slipped in about up to his waist.
Unfortunately, inside the hole was a bear.
As shown in the video reenactment above, the hole that the man fell into was occupied by a hibernating bear. At least, the bear had been hibernating, until it suddenly had an uninvited guest in what was supposed to be its single-occupancy sleeping space.
Startled and panicking, the bear bit the man on his left calf, and even after he pulled himself back up out of the hole, it followed him out into the snow. Noticing his companion, the bear moved to attack her as well, but the man poked at the animal with the hiking poles he was carrying, and the bear then fled off into the forest.
There has been a spike in the number of bear attacks on people and property in Japan over the last year, so much so that “bear” was selected as the Kanji of the Year for 2025. However, in this instance, public sentiment seems to be strongly on the bear’s side, judging from online comments such as:
“You really can’t say the bear was in the wrong here.”
“A rare case of bear self-defense.”
“The bear must have been even more surprised than the hiker.”
“‘All of a sudden I saw a pair of feet come crashing through my roof. It was so terrifying.’”
“I mean, if some dude just barged into my house, I’d be scared and start trying to fight him off too.”
“Poor bear was just doing what it’s supposed to and hibernating.”
“‘How am I supposed to get any sleep like this?!?’”
The two hikers were able to find their way back to the designated course and return to town under their own power, and medical examiners determined that the man’s injury is minor and should heal. The bear’s level of sleepiness remains unknown.
Though the hikers were off course unintentionally, the incident serves to highlight another reason why it’s important to stick to the trail, as doing so helps maintain a buffer between humans and wildlife that’s important for their mutual safety. Thankfully, there have been no calls to cull the bear, seeing as how the encounter came about as a result of the hikers being in a part of the mountain they shouldn’t have been in, but the bear might want to think about upgrading its next hibernation lair with some fancy Bluetooth doors that one Japanese company sells to help keep people spaces and bear spaces separated.
