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Brown bear in Slovakia (symbolic image): chased away with screams and a dog
Photo: xscigelovax / Pond5 Images / IMAGO
A hiker died while fleeing a brown bear in Slovakia.
The 31-year-old tourist from Belarus fell from a great height down a slope and sustained fatal head injuries, a police spokeswoman said, according to the TASR agency.
This was determined by a forensic pathologist.
The accident occurred in the Demänovska Dolina valley in the Low Tatras, a mountain range in the Carpathians.
The woman and her companion encountered the bear early on Friday evening.
The man ran in another direction and was uninjured.
He alerted the rescue workers.
Gunshots, a dog and screams
At first it was incorrectly assumed that the brown bear had attacked the woman.
When the mountain rescue service arrived, the wild animal was still in the immediate vicinity, according to the emergency services.
"Fortunately, the bear was able to be driven away with the help of a service dog, screams and a warning shot from a police officer," said a spokesman.
According to studies by the State Nature Conservation Agency in collaboration with scientists from Charles University in Prague, there are around 1,100 to 1,200 wild bears in Slovakia.
They usually avoid people.
If there is a surprise encounter or if female bears believe their cubs are threatened, they can also attack.
In the current case it is still unclear whether it was a male or a female animal.
jpz/dpa