Venomous Snakes & Bear Attacks | When Predators Attack MEGA Episode | Nat Geo Animals
Nat Geo Animals
0:01 NARRATOR: We're on a collision course with the world's deadliest predators.
0:07 (hiss) Do we stand a chance...
0:10 (growling)♪♪ ...when predators attack?
0:20 Snakes and humans have a complicated relationship.
0:26 In some parts of the world, they're revered for their strength and wisdom.
0:34 In others, the serpent's role as the villain in the Garden
0:38 of Eden story has made it much less popular.
0:43 Snakes have the power to fascinate and repel us simultaneously.
0:48 It's still a mystery exactly how they came into being some 20 million years ago,
0:55 long after the dinosaurs had gone extinct.
1:02 While some believe snakes evolved from water creatures,
1:05 others suggest their closest ancestor was
1:08 a reptile similar to a monitor lizard...
1:11 with legs and feet.
1:17 They lived underground,
1:19 and natural selection favored those with the smallest limbs,
1:22 for easier burrowing.
1:28 Eventually, their legs and feet were eliminated altogether,
1:34 while additional vertebrae were added.
1:40 This length and flexibility allows snakes to navigate
1:45 in a variety of environments— on the ground, in the water, and up in the trees.
1:57 Today there are more than 3,000 species of snakes on the planet...
2:02 some more dangerous to man than others.
2:05 (rattling) Every year,
2:09 the rattlesnake bites more people in the United States than any other snake...
2:14 (rattling) ...thanks to its extensive range.
2:23 It's found everywhere in the United States,
2:26 but the greatest concentration is in the Southwest and northern Mexico.
2:34 Rattlesnakes range in size from species to species,
2:38 but share the same method of defense and attack.
2:44 (rattling) When threatened,
2:46 this snake warns with a distinct rattle— the sound of hollow
2:50 scales knocking against each other in the end of its tail.
2:57 Then its long moveable fangs snap out like switchblade knives.
3:02 Its strike is lightning fast.
3:10 All snakes have the ability to control their venom release.
3:14 Sometimes a dry bite will suffice, by scaring off a challenger to avoid a fight.
3:20 If not, a snake will go in for the kill,
3:23 releasing its venom in the amount it sees fit.
3:29 The majority of rattlers pump out
3:33 hemotoxins that destroys blood cells and tissue,
3:37 reducing the ability of the blood to clot.
3:41 The result--hemorrhaging.
3:48 This rare microscopic look shows a rattler's venom attacking healthy cells.
3:56 (siren) Most bites are painful within
4:01 five minutes and, if left untreated, fatal.
4:07 November in the Florida panhandle.
4:11 Herpetologist Bruce Means is studying rattlesnake mating habits.
4:15 Today, he's looking for a female rattlesnake to feed
4:19 a transmitter to so he can track her movements.
4:21 BRUCE: There you are, you beautiful little creature.
4:23 Now, let's see here.
4:28 I had hoped to be the one herpetologist who
4:32 in his career had never been bitten by a venomous snake.
4:36 Well, unfortunately working with venomous snakes is a risky profession.
4:45 NARRATOR: Bruce is about to get up
4:47 close and personal with the world's largest rattlesnake.
4:59 BRUCE: I really was euphoric, thinking what a wonderful day this was,
5:04 not ever expecting that I was
5:06 going to encounter an eastern diamondback rattlesnake.
5:08 (rattling) Look at you.
5:14 Well, I wanted a photograph, the light was right, and I had my camera with me.
5:18 I took several photographs of the snake.
5:21 You know, at that point, that should have been sufficient.
5:26 And I'll never know why, I decided I had to pick the snake up.
5:32 Nice snake.
5:34 Hello!
5:35 NARRATOR: Bruce finds a stick to pin the snake's head.
5:41 But it's too short.
5:44 (rattling) BRUCE: Okay, baby.
5:45 (rattling) (rattling) NARRATOR: The rattlesnake sounds off a warning.
5:57 (rattling) Then strikes.
6:05 BRUCE: Mmm!
6:06 Mmm!
6:07 At first, the pain was nothing more than a pin prick.
6:12 NARRATOR: But the moment the venom enters Bruce's bloodstream,
6:15 it attacks his tissues and cells,
6:18 setting off a chain reaction that could paralyze his entire system.
6:23 BRUCE: I began feeling symptoms right away with this snakebite.
6:25 I felt tingling on the tops of both of my hands.
6:28 Mmm!
6:29 Mmm!
6:30 Mmm!
6:37 I wanted to just panic.
6:46 I mean, I already knew how dangerous it was to be envenomated...
6:50 (rattling) ...and here I was on an island, a long way away from any help.
7:03 I had a long walk to go to get to the kayak,
7:08 and then I had an even longer passage to make across the bay.
7:13 NARRATOR: He needs to stay calm so he can paddle the mile back to the mainland.
7:18 BRUCE: And as I was going, I was thinking to myself,
7:20 "I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it." NARRATOR:
7:26 It's been nearly 20 minutes since the bite,
7:29 and Bruce knows this viper's venom can kill a man in as little as an hour.
7:34 BRUCE: I said, "You've got to not panic." Don't think about
7:39 how long a paddle it will be to get to shore.
7:42 Don't think about you're all alone.
7:45 Don't think about you could die.
7:47 NARRATOR: The venom spreads throughout his body,
7:49 soon blocking the nerve impulses to his lower limbs.
7:55 BRUCE: When I got to shore, I couldn't get out of the kayak.
7:59 Ugh!
8:01 I was totally paralyzed from the legs down.
8:05 You're trying to keep as low as you can,
8:07 and you, you inch yourself along the ground,
8:09 you know, you're wiggling your body back and forth and pulling with your arms.
8:18 NARRATOR: Now, an hour since the bite,
8:21 the venom is close to paralyzing one of his most
8:25 critical organs— his diaphragm— which will stop his breathing.
8:32 (breathing heavily)♪♪♪♪ (breathing heavily) Bruce manages to drive
8:47 his truck a mile down the road to find help.
8:54 By the time he arrives at a hospital,
8:56 he'll need 26 units of antivenom to save his life.
9:00 (rattling)♪♪ Bruce is extremely lucky to be alive.
9:11 BRUCE: The rattlesnake, it was absolutely no fault of its own,
9:13 that it was protecting itself from this monster that was
9:16 trying to jam its head in the sand with a stick.
9:18 (rattling) NARRATOR: Despite his close call,
9:23 Bruce still chases down and studies these deadly creatures.
9:29 BRUCE: There is a bit of a danger, even now, for me working with these animals.
9:33 I mean, I love them.
9:34 I empathize with them.
9:35 I understand them.
9:37 And you know, familiarity, in this case, drops my guard.
9:41 That's not good.
9:43 (rattling) I have to force myself now to remember that's a dangerous animal.
9:49 NARRATOR: Because of their large range and potent hemotoxic venom,
9:53 rattlesnakes are responsible for the majority of snakebite fatalities in the US.
9:59 Still, they're no match for this desert viper.
10:08 NARRATOR: The saw-scaled viper is the world's deadliest snake.
10:14 Extremely common, it kills hundreds of people every year.
10:24 (hissing) It inhabits the deserts and rocky outcroppings
10:29 from northern Africa and the Middle East through India,
10:33 where it spends most of its day buried underneath the sand,
10:38 removed from the blistering heat.
10:41 Confronted, it offers its own distinct warning.
10:45 (scratching) It rubs its serrated scales together to produce
10:50 a rasping sound similar to a saw cutting wood.
10:55 A warning well heeded.
11:00 Like the rattlesnake,
11:01 the saw-scaled viper injects its prey with hemotoxic venom...
11:09 which destroys blood cells and tissues,
11:13 causing burning, swelling, and hemorrhaging.
11:17 Without antivenom, cardiovascular and renal failure may occur.
11:24 Hemotoxic venom is found in the majority of the world's most dangerous snakes,
11:28 from the forest floor to the tree tops.
11:33 One canopy lover is found in Africa's arid forests south of the Sahara Desert,
11:38 stretching to South Africa and the islands off Africa's southeast coast.
11:46 It's called the boomslang, and it's perfectly camouflaged to hunt from above.
11:57 Females are usually brown, blending into branches...
12:06 while males are brighter colors like green, keeping them concealed among leaves.
12:17 The coarse-edged scales on its stomach provide grip...
12:21 allowing the boomslang to climb straight up...
12:27 where it waits patiently for one of its favorite meals to come within reach.
12:43 The boomslang strikes, gripping prey with rear-facing fangs.
12:48 It chews until its hemotoxic venom takes
12:51 effect and the prey hemorrhages to death.
12:57 This ground hunter employs a different toxic cocktail to subdue its victims.
13:04 The inland taipan roams in the sparsely
13:07 populated area of southwestern Queensland and South Australia.
13:19 A largely solitary hunter, it avoids human contact.
13:25 But it preys on mice and rats, so it's often found in proximity to humans.
13:32 And that's when the trouble begins.
13:37 When threatened, the taipan raises its body
13:40 in a tight S-shaped curve, then strikes...
13:44 repeatedly.
13:53 It floods its target with venom,
13:56 withdraws to a safe distance, then injects another deadly dose.
14:04 A taipan's bite paralyzes a prey's nervous system,
14:08 resulting in respiratory failure and death.
14:11 (squeaking) This highly potent venom is neurotoxic.
14:17 Just one milligram--a drop about the size
14:21 of a pinhead— can kill a thousand mice.
14:28 Neurotoxic venom can prove deadly on land and at sea.
14:34 The banded sea krait roams from the Bay of Bengal
14:40 across the South China Sea to the Pacific Ocean.
14:46 It's supremely equipped for aquatic life.
14:51 Its right lung fills nearly the length of its body.
14:56 So it can dive over 30 feet below the surface
15:00 and stay submerged for at least half an hour.
15:09 A stroke of its flattened, paddle-like tail propels it forward for the strike.
15:18 Neurotoxins shut down this eel's nervous system,
15:25 while myotoxins bind to muscle fibers, rapidly destroying them.
15:33 Paralyzed, the eel dies of suffocation.
15:40 Another type of venom has the power to dissolve a prey's tissues in one strike.
15:48 Found from northeastern India,
15:50 Bangladesh and Bhutan across southern China to northern Malaysia,
15:57 the monocled cobra is known for its proud stance and distinct hood.
16:03 (hiss) It intimidates aggressors by standing tall,
16:07 spreading its hood, and hissing loudly...
16:09 (hissing) ...before striking with a powerful
16:15 mix of neurotoxic and cytotoxic venom.
16:21 While neurotoxins attack its prey's nervous system,
16:24 cytotoxins dissolve tissues and organs.
16:33 (siren) After being bitten, a human victim may die in as little as 30 minutes.
16:41 Despite the obvious danger,
16:43 humans have long been fascinated by the cobra and the challenge to charm them.
16:48 (pungi playing)♪♪ In Punta Gorda, Florida,
16:56 snake handler David Weathers spends hours each day honing his skills.
17:05 His snakes are housed in a shed behind his home.
17:12 He's preparing for a show the following day,
17:15 stacking boxes of snakes to load into his truck.
17:20 This monocled cobra is the last to load.
17:25 His father and a friend record the process on videotape.
17:32 This is the actual footage from that night.
17:38 KEVIN: Absolutely had no idea that anything was going to happen.
17:41 He had packed up everything else,
17:42 this was either the last or next to last snake to go.
17:48 I had no idea that anything was going to happen with this snake.
17:52 DAVID: Not that short.
17:54 KEVIN: Let's see.
17:56 Oh, yeah.
17:57 Just enough to get through your shirt.
17:59 Good thing you had that shirt on.
18:00 DAVID: Yeah, thick shirt on.
18:03 Ow!
18:04 (bleep) KEVIN: Oh, boy.
18:07 (bleep) NARRATOR: Snake wrangler David Weathers
18:11 has been bitten by a deadly cobra.
18:13 DAVID: I'm bit.
18:14 We gotta go to the hospital.
18:16 MAN: (bleep) Got venom in there?
18:18 DAVID: Yeah, I squeezed a lot out.
18:19 Damn it.
18:25 Yeah, I got a severe pain in my stomach,
18:27 because that's where I got bit, right in the stomach.
18:29 NARRATOR: David's friend races him to the hospital.
18:32 ALBERT: The panic had struck both of us, actually,
18:35 because we both realized that we had no antivenom.
18:37 I knew it was a race against time.
18:40 DAVID: There's a scratch where he went for a second bite.
18:42 There's a fang mark there and a scratch here.
18:45 All that in there is localized venom that's starting to go through my system.
18:48 (phone ringing) We get the— I can't even talk.
18:52 Sorry.
18:52 Hello.
18:52 Sorry, sweetie, listen, I'm on my way to the hospital.
18:56 I just got bit by a cobra real bad.
18:58 I'm having problems breathing.
19:00 ALBERT: I was doing a good 95, 100 miles an hour through traffic lights.
19:05 DAVID: Start honking your horn, just honk your horn, lay on your horn.
19:07 ALBERT: I was thinking that it's a good possibility,
19:09 by of his reactions, that he could actually die.
19:12 DAVID: I feel worse, that I'm being stabbed in the stomach.
19:16 (horn blaring) NARRATOR: The cobra venom attacks David's muscle tissue,
19:25 and the debris from dead muscle cells begins to clog his kidneys.
19:31 Soon they'll shut down, and he'll be in full renal failure.
19:36 ALBERT: His wound was turning blacker and blacker,
19:39 and it looked like it was just ready to explode any minute.
19:42 Every second was critical.
19:43 Every second that went by was a little bit closer to his death.
19:52 NARRATOR: David finally arrives at the hospital in Fort Myers,
19:57 just 20 minutes after the bite.
19:59 WOMAN: How long ago?
20:01 DAVID: 20 minutes ago, 20 minutes ago, tops.
20:06 NARRATOR: But the hospital does not stock cobra antivenom.
20:17 David must wait for it to arrive from a special poison unit,
20:22 and the clock is ticking.
20:26 DR.
20:26 GREENE: People can go downhill very fast and die right in front
20:30 of you even after they had been fine for 30 minutes.
20:33 NARRATOR: Al Cruz of the medical unit Venom 1 is
20:37 shocked when he finally arrives at the hospital with the antivenom.
20:40 AL: David was there laying in bed telling me, "I feel fine." I said,
20:45 "You've just been hit by one of the deadliest cobras in the world.
20:49 You're far from fine?" NARRATOR:
20:52 David is immediately given 5 vials of the antivenom.
20:55 But it isn't working.
20:57 AL: His bloodwork was so dangerously high,
21:00 his kidneys were ready to shut down on him.
21:04 NARRATOR: Despite the risk of an overdose, David is given 5 more vials.
21:11 And finally...he pulls through.
21:20 David spent weeks in recovery contemplating what happened.
21:29 DAVID: I don't hold any grudges like against the animals,
21:32 you know, he's doing his job.
21:33 He's being a cobra, he did what he was supposed to do,
21:36 and I just definitely wasn't doing what I was supposed to do.
21:40 (hiss) NARRATOR: Even an experienced snake handler can misread a moment.
21:49 When we let our guard down, the result can be deadly.
21:56 Los Angeles, California.
22:01 33-year-old Anita Finch lives alone in a trailer
22:06 park with a variety of pet snakes.
22:14 KARIN: She was always interested in creatures.
22:18 She wasn't interested in dolls.
22:21 So she didn't make friends very easily because of that.
22:27 She was teased and bullied in school.
22:31 She was ridiculed.
22:34 NARRATOR: From a young age,
22:35 Anita saw that few people understood her passion for reptiles.
22:39 So she learned to hide it.
22:44 Her trailer home is her safe haven— a place
22:48 she can live judgment-free with her collection of snakes.
22:51 She's happy, but others are wary.
22:56 CHARLENE: As a manager, I shouldn't have allowed it.
22:59 And I mentioned it to her, I said because this is dangerous, and she says "Look,
23:03 they are all in an aquarium with their names,
23:07 they're never outside." I said okay, I don't want to know any more than that.
23:12 NARRATOR: Anita is looking for the next species to add to her collection.
23:16 Without the proper permits, she illegally acquires a deadly Gaboon viper.
23:26 The Gaboon viper is armed with the longest fangs in the serpent kingdom.
23:33 Its leaf-shaped head is almost the size of a human fist.
23:41 With a stout body that stretches up to seven feet,
23:44 it weighs as much as a medium-sized dog.
23:51 It's a patient hunter.
23:54 In the wild, it blends into forest floor and waits for prey for hours.
24:06 When the moment's right, the Gaboon strikes.
24:11 Hollow fangs inject hemotoxic venom directly into prey...
24:24 ...causing uncontrolled internal bleeding and death.
24:32 Fangs up to 2 inches long slowly walk the victim into the snake's mouth.
24:46 With this new addition, Anita's collection is finally complete.
24:51 KARIN: To get ahold of something like that, you know— I mean,
24:55 it was like the diamond,
24:57 I think she thought it was just something so rare and beautiful.
25:03 NARRATOR: Anita likes to free-handle her venomous snakes and often
25:06 lets them roam freely when she cleans the tanks.
25:10 The Gaboon is no exception.
25:13 CHARLENE: But I said any day you're playing so much with the danger.
25:16 You don't understand what those animals can do.
25:28 NARRATOR: December 15th.
25:29 (knocking) MAN: Anita, you there?
25:34 Anita!
25:35 (knocking) NARRATOR: It's been three days since Anita has last been seen.
25:41 CHARLENE: I walked in her house,
25:43 and what I saw was not something I wish on anybody.
25:47 (sirens) NARRATOR: Police are called to a Los Angeles trailer
25:58 home to to investigate what is reported as a possible homicide.
26:02 LIEUTENANT SMITH: The first thing you notice when you
26:04 walk in the house is the odor of reptiles.
26:07 (rattling) It's got a very unique smell, and it was very strong,
26:16 which tells me that there was a lot of reptiles.
26:19 (radio chatter) There was a lot of blood on the floor,
26:24 there was also copious amounts in the toilet in the restroom,
26:29 in the sink in the restroom as well as the floor of the restroom,
26:34 and drops of blood leading down the hall.
26:36 NARRATOR: They're horrified when they discover Anita Finch's lifeless body.
26:40 SMITH: It kind of, to me, literally looked like somebody had just attacked
26:43 her with a ball bat or something.
26:46 I didn't fully realize it was indeed a snakebite until I
26:51 actually got up and did the physical examination on the body.
26:55 When I touched her hand, I had holes that were oozing fluid out of them.
27:00 This is definitely a snakebite.
27:03 NARRATOR: Police investigate the fangs of all her snakes.
27:08 SMITH: There was the one, the Gaboon viper,
27:09 that we were more interested in, and opening up its mouth,
27:12 of all the snakes, that was the one that certainly lined up.
27:17 NARRATOR: A story of what had happened begins to emerge.
27:28 SMITH: It hit her twice on her hand.
27:31 It's known to be fatal within 15 minutes,
27:36 so I should imagine anything and everything
27:39 that happened had to have happened very quick.
27:41 (groaning)♪♪♪♪ JOHN: In a sense there was no help.
27:57 I don't think anybody could have gotten to her with antivenin quick
28:02 enough or gotten her to a hospital that had the proper antivenin.
28:07 NARRATOR: Anita didn't call 911.
28:10 But in her last moments she may have hoped someone would find her in time.
28:15 She was found clutching a note with the name
28:18 of the hospital she should be taken to.
28:22 Each year, venomous snakes kill as many as 90,000 people worldwide.
28:28 But not all snakes are venomous.
28:31 The majority are constrictors— monsters with massive jaws and super strength.
28:44 The green anaconda kills with power, not potion.
28:50 It's the world's heavyweight champion,
28:54 reaching 30 feet in length— nearly the size
28:57 of a school bus— and weighing more than three grown men.
29:03 Its body can be over a foot in diameter.
29:13 It thrives in the South American tropics,
29:17 from Venezuela to the Amazon's southern edge— anywhere there is water.
29:28 Its forked tongue searches the air for scent trails left by prey.
29:34 Then it waits in ambush...
29:37 with only its head visible above the water line.
29:41 Stealth gives way to raw power.
29:45 The anaconda's teeth are arranged in a double row
29:50 and point backward to catch and hold struggling prey.
29:58 It wraps around its victim and begins the squeeze.
30:02 Every time the prey exhales, the snake tightens its grip.
30:07 Even a 300-pound black caiman can fall
30:10 victim to an anaconda's crushing death coil.
30:17 An anaconda can easily stretch its jaws wider than its own head,
30:22 to a maximum gape of 180 degrees— wide enough to swallow a man whole.
30:37 Jose Damaso, a native of northern Peru,
30:41 has seen these colossal serpents in the swamps around his home.
30:48 (speaking Spanish) JOSE, TRANSLATED: There are some five swamps near the Hurán.
30:52 Ever since I was 17, I've been going there.
30:55 I went alone or with my father-in-law.
30:58 We went all over the mountain to fish, everywhere.
31:10 (growls) There are lots of animals there—
31:14 not just anaconda— there are lots of animals.
31:17 (birds chirping) NARRATOR:
31:23 Jose and his father-in-law trek to a familiar fishing spot.
31:30 It's a place known to harbor green anacondas.
31:39 (speaking Spanish) JOSE: At any moment, if you go there, you might see it.
31:44 It's there sunbathing, curled up.
31:46 And it's listening, and it's watching.
31:50 When you move, it sees you.
31:58 NARRATOR: The men split up to find their own pools.
32:04 As Jose focuses on his catch, a super serpent begins its stealth attack.
32:15 The anaconda can hold its breath for up to 10 minutes.
32:20 Fully concealed, it closes in.
32:32 (screaming)♪♪ NARRATOR: Razor-sharp teeth dig into Jose Damaso's thigh.
32:42 If the anaconda succeeds in coiling, there will be no chance of escape.
32:50 JOSE: I jumped to my feet.
32:52 I grabbed its head and threw it off me.
32:54 If I didn't, it would have dragged me away.
32:58 (screaming) NARRATOR: Jose's quick reaction may have saved his life.
33:04 (speaking Spanish) JOSE: When the snake let go,
33:08 I shouted for my father-in-law and I took off running.
33:13 NARRATOR: But he is left with a reminder
33:15 of just how close he came to the unthinkable.
33:22 JOSE: I lifted my leg like this, and three teeth came out.
33:26 One more is still in there.
33:44 NARRATOR: Jose knows he took a risk entering the snake's domain.
33:49 (speaking Spanish) JOSE: It has grown up there— that animal, that anaconda,
33:55 since it was small, and it has grown into such a tremendous animal.
33:59 Even now, it's still living there.
34:06 NARRATOR: This constrictor's stealth attack came from below,
34:10 but another killer snake hunts from above.
34:17 (scream) The reticulated python is the world's longest snake...
34:30 a monster that can grow up to 30 feet long...
34:38 and weigh over 300 pounds— the weight of two grown men.
34:46 Like the anaconda, this super serpent doesn't need venom to kill its prey.
34:56 Its 10,000 muscles squeeze its dinner to death.
35:04 Reticulated pythons range from India to Indonesia...
35:11 a region packed with hot, humid rainforests, rivers and dark caves.
35:23 These places give the serpent the cover it needs
35:25 to hide its massive body while it waits in ambush.
35:32 This python blends into its surroundings
35:35 with an intercrossed or "reticulated" pattern...
35:44 while its elliptical cat-like pupils open wide to optimize night vision.
35:52 Heat-sensing pit organs detect the body heat of passing prey.
35:58 And chemical sensors on its tongue pick up odors from the air.
36:15 In an instant, the snake traps its prey with sharp, backward-curving teeth...
36:26 ...then begins the squeeze— stopping the flow of blood and oxygen.
36:35 The victim dies of suffocation.
36:48 Like the anaconda, pythons swallow prey whole,
36:52 using a unique lower jaw that detaches at the front.
37:03 Its highly elastic skin stretches out as its jaws consume the meal.
37:14 (footsteps) Plantation worker Ee Chung Huan walks
37:22 on a forest path in rural Malaysia...
37:37 ...when either his chemical scent, the vibrations of his footsteps,
37:44 or the heat of his body catches the attention of a super snake.
38:09 NARRATOR: A 22-foot reticulated python hits Huan at full force.
38:15 (scream) Huan collapses, unable to move.
38:21 And then the snake slips its coils around his chest and neck.
38:26 Huan's struggle ends there, as he takes his last breath.
38:32 The python releases Huan's leg and begins
38:35 moving towards his head for the swallow.
38:40 Police Sergeant Abu Samah took this photo.
38:46 He was searching for Huan when he discovered the body.
38:53 ABU, TRANSLATED: The snake was sucking the victim in.
38:56 The sound was like a snoring sound.
39:00 NARRATOR: The python tried to escape, but Samah shot it dead.
39:07 Despite stories like these, pythons
39:09 and other large constrictors are popular pets.
39:16 Trendy, fashionable, hip.
39:20 Hundreds of thousands of pet pythons are
39:22 in the hands of responsible owners across the globe.
39:28 But cohabitating with large reptiles has its risks.
39:32 (struggling) A Las Vegas family has a new pet.
39:45 All the Cyruses enjoy their python, especially nine-year-old Katherine.
39:52 KATHERINE: I'm never really afraid of anything.
39:55 She didn't really have a name before, so we named her Victoria.
39:59 I thought of her as a pet, I mean, I liked her more than a dog.
40:04 PHILLIP: I got her, she was probably about four foot.
40:07 She was just somebody around the house.
40:10 Just a pet...quiet...
40:12 I mean, very clean.
40:14 NARRATOR: But Victoria is growing up fast.
40:18 In just four years she's almost quadrupled in size,
40:22 fueled by her ceaseless appetite.
40:31 August 2008.
40:40 (heart beating)♪♪ KATHERINE: I was sleeping...
40:50 and I felt, you know, like something bit me.
40:58 She's really strong, and every time you move, she tightens up more.
41:02 I could hear popping.
41:03 'Cause every time I'd move,
41:04 she would just get tighter and move up towards my chest.
41:08 She squeezed on to my ribs.
41:10 NARRATOR: Victoria is set to feed...
41:13 and Katherine is rapidly becoming her next meal.
41:17 (whimpering) PHILLIP: You cannot even imagine how strong these snakes are.
41:21 The strength is there, that snake is ready to eat, and it's eating time.
41:26 I ran back down the hall into the kitchen, grabbed a butcher knife.
41:30 NARRATOR: The only way to get the python to let up is complete decapitation.
41:43 PHILLIP: I liked the snake.
41:45 (laughs) I didn't hesitate when it come to my daughter.
41:48 I mean, I didn't even think about it.
41:51 KATHERINE: I think about if my dad wasn't there, where would I be?
41:56 And when I do tell the story, some people don't even believe me.
42:01 But I have scars.
42:03 Two big scars where they pulled the teeth out of my leg.
42:08 NARRATOR: Katherine is lucky, but her experience follows an unfortunate pattern.
42:15 In the U.S., in the last decade alone,
42:18 nearly ten people have been killed by their pet pythons.
42:22 (siren) OPERATOR: What's the problem?
42:27 Tell me exactly what happened.
42:28 MAN: We have a Burmese python.
42:30 She's about 12 foot long.
42:31 She got out of the cage last night and got
42:34 into the baby's crib and strangled her to death.
42:37 (sobbing) OPERATOR: Stay on the line please.
42:41 Okay, how old is the patient?
42:43 MAN: She's only two years old.
42:45 Oh, my God, I can't believe this.
42:49 (sobbing) Poor baby.
42:52 OPERATOR: Okay, sir, sir, are you still there?
42:54 Sir, can you still hear me?
42:55 MAN: Yes, ma'am.
42:57 OPERATOR: Do you believe she's beyond any help?
43:04 CALLER: She's gone...
43:06 and I couldn't help her.
43:10 How could we do this?
43:13 NARRATOR: Snake-related incidents like these are on the rise.
43:18 Many owners end up with a lot more snake than they can handle.
43:22 Some get loose, and others are abandoned,
43:26 left to roam freely in our neighborhoods and wreak havoc on the ecosystem.
43:32 We put ourselves, each other,
43:34 and the environment in danger because of our curiosity,
43:40 adoration, and obsession.
43:42 (car starts)♪♪ We may take wild animals out of the wild,
43:51 and we may think we know them.
43:53 But snakes and their unique behaviors
43:56 will always remain unpredictable and dangerous.
44:08 NARRATOR: We're on a collision course with the world's deadliest predators.
44:15 Do we stand a chance?
44:20 When Predators Attack.
44:26 Bears are iconic symbols of nature;
44:30 a treasure to see in the wild, when kept at an appropriate distance.
44:38 Some 30 million years ago, bears and dogs looked alike,
44:42 having evolved from the same carnivorous ancestors.
44:45 Over time they grew bigger and stronger...
44:49 and split into the eight bear species we now know today.
44:56 These bears all share a similar lethal package.
44:59 (roar) Powerful jaws and killer claws.
45:05 But each species has a unique set
45:07 of skills that sets them apart from one another.
45:13 In the protected wilderness of Yellowstone National Park,
45:18 a herd of elk graze what they can before the snow blankets the ground.
45:25 But they are not alone.
45:29 They share the park with a surprisingly stealthy hunter.
45:37 (roaring) (roaring) The American black bear.
45:56 It can stand up to 6 feet tall and weigh nearly 600 pounds...
46:03 and yet goes unnoticed in its forest
46:05 environment thanks to its dark, bristly fur.
46:11 (growl) It hides, and stalks prey from above.
46:17 Its short, sharp, curved claws make it an expert climber and acrobat.
46:25 The black bear is armed with a keen sense of smell...
46:31 several times greater than a bloodhound's, and excellent hearing,
46:39 believed to be more than twice as sensitive as a human's.
46:44 When it spots its prey,
46:47 it runs up to 30 miles per hour, faster than an Olympic sprinter.
46:58 And tears into its victim with teeth over an inch long.
47:07 American Black bears roam from the easternmost
47:10 part of North America, northern Mexico,
47:13 up through the United States, including much of Canada,
47:19 where two vacationers are about to encounter the unthinkable.
47:25 (roar, screaming) Ontario's Lake Missinaibi Provincial Park.
47:36 130 miles of rugged coastline, the only access in is by boat.
47:44 A young married couple is two days into an annual week-long camping trip.
47:55 Jacqueline Perry and Mark Jordan are enjoying
47:58 a relaxing break from their city life.
48:04 Until a dark shape appears from behind the brush.
48:15 MARK: Jac!
48:16 Bear!
48:17 NARRATOR: A black bear lunges at Jacqueline.
48:18 (roar) (screaming) (growl) (roar) (screaming) Mark grabs the bear
48:28 around the neck and tries to pry it off her.
48:33 (roaring)♪♪ The bear bites Mark on the neck,
48:46 then turns its attention back to Jacqueline.
48:51 Mark grabs the only weapon at hand--his pocketknife—
48:55 and jumps between the bear and his wife.
49:01 (roar) They battle for several minutes,
49:12 Mark's knife finding the bear over and over.
49:20 (growling) Until the bear backs off.
49:30 Mark picks up his wife's limp body.
49:46 With nowhere else to go, he takes to the lake.
49:55 (growling) And just as Mark reaches the boats,
50:00 the bear abruptly turns and walks back through the camp,
50:04 disappearing into the bush from which it came.
50:15 MARK: Help me!
50:20 Help me!
50:21 Help us, please!
50:24 NARRATOR: But his echo is the only response.
50:26 (crying) RYTIS: I hear like, screaming, you know, sort of like shouting,
50:31 like, at first I didn't realize what it was,
50:33 then I realized it's "Help!" VYTAS: And I said to my son, "Something is wrong.
50:39 Go, go see what's happening." NARRATOR:
50:44 Father and son campers discover the battered couple.
50:51 RYTIS: So I grabbed his boat, canoe, to pull it to the shore, and I look, "Oh,
50:54 my God," and the canoe is like half filled with like red water,
50:57 you know, blood, bloody water.
51:00 NARRATOR: The men help Jacqueline and Mark onto their larger, faster boat.
51:07 VYTAS: And when I was lifting her, there were
51:09 wounds from bear claws like four, four deep wounds.
51:18 He had a very bad wound, all this muscle was torn,
51:22 you know, and it was bleeding, and he was totally white.
51:26 He was, he lost a lot of blood.
51:30 NARRATOR: The men speed to the mainland.
51:39 When they finally reach shore, Mark gets the help he needs.
51:45 But Jacqueline doesn't last through the trip.
51:49 Black bears are normally shy and avoid humans altogether.
51:54 But when on the brink of starvation, they may see people as prey.
52:00 In the last 10 years,
52:01 there have been around 25 fatal black bear incidents in North America.
52:10 And in densely populated areas,
52:14 black bears and humans are meeting each other more and more.
52:25 Adapting their behavior in bold and unpredictable ways.
52:34 New Jersey, USA.
52:38 LISA: It was my daughter's second birthday,
52:40 and I had gotten up early and made brownies
52:43 to take to playgroup with us to celebrate her birthday.
52:46 It was a school day for my son,
52:48 so he gotten up and dressed and he was in the living room,
52:51 eating a Pop-Tart, watching TV,
52:53 and I was in my daughter's room getting her dressed.
52:56 I heard a noise at the screen door, and I was about to call out to him.
53:01 BOY: Ahh!
53:02 Mom!
53:02 Bear's coming in!
53:04 Bear's coming in!
53:06 LISA: I grabbed the kids, ran down the hall to my bedroom,
53:09 we closed the door and called 911.
53:11 Close the door!
53:14 It was terrifying.
53:16 I was scared for my children.
53:19 There's a bear at the door, there's a bear at the front door of the house.
53:23 Yes.
53:24 (growling, scratching) Oh, my god!
53:25 It's in the house!
53:26 It's in the house!
53:27 We just heard the noise, it's in the house!
53:29 (growl) NARRATOR: The black bear breaks in looking for a meal.
53:38 LISA: She opened a cabinet and ate Ovaltine and pastina
53:42 and dry cereal and all kinds of stuff like that.
53:46 NARRATOR: The bear ignored the humans cowering
53:49 in the bedroom and no one was hurt.
53:52 But the family learned of the danger in their backyard.
53:58 And there are bigger bears out there.
54:03 (roaring) NARRATOR: The elk in Yellowstone work double
54:15 time to protect their calves from hungry bears.
54:21 It'll be weeks before this calf's legs are strong enough to outrun predators.
54:38 Sensing danger, the mother moves away
54:40 from the newborn so she doesn't reveal its location.
54:46 A newborn's scent is so faint, few predators will even know it's there.
54:57 But this grizzly is close and has one
55:00 of the most sensitive noses in the Animal Kingdom.
55:16 This mother and her two cubs are famished after six months of winter sleep.
55:24 And hidden all around them is a feast.
55:28 This baby elk is without defense.
55:45 (growl)♪♪♪♪ The grizzly.
55:58 This brown bear is one of the largest land carnivores in the United States,
56:03 weighing up to half a ton and standing at 9 feet tall.
56:09 And it's still fast.
56:12 A full-size grizzly can gallop for 2 miles at speeds of 35 miles per hour.
56:20 A grizzly's bite strength rivals that of carnivores like leopards.
56:26 Its claws extend up to 4 inches long, four times the size of the black bear's.
56:36 And the grizzly has an added weapon in its arsenal...
56:42 the shoulder hump.
56:45 A dense pack of muscle connected to a grizzly's shoulders and forearms.
56:51 It delivers extra force that comes in handy
56:55 when grizzlies dig deep in the earth for roots,
56:59 fight over food or mates, and take down large prey.
57:05 (growl) These massive mammals once roamed throughout the mountainous
57:13 regions of the western continental US, Alaska and Canada.
57:19 But human encroachment has drastically reduced the grizzly's domain and numbers.
57:26 In the US, only about 1,000 grizzlies still roam,
57:30 mostly in the country's popular national parks.
57:36 August 2005.
57:40 Johan Otter and his 18-year-old daughter, Jenna,
57:43 are on an early-morning hike in Montana's Glacier National Park.
57:52 The heart of grizzly country.
57:55 JOHAN: When you're in Glacier, that part, you're in the middle of wilderness.
58:00 There's no civilization; there's no help out there whatsoever.
58:07 JENNA: We started on the trail.
58:08 It was relatively quiet since it was about 7:30, 8:00 in the morning.
58:14 We started walking, just talking loud.
58:18 General precaution when you're in grizzly bear country is to make noise
58:22 so that you alert whatever animals are around you of your presence.
58:29 And it was about two hours into our hike when we came around a blind corner,
58:36 and coming the opposite direction was a mother grizzly bear and two cubs.
58:41 And we just kind of hit face-on at about six feet away.
58:46 JOHAN: And she takes two steps back and says something like,
58:50 "Oh, no," and suddenly I see this animal running at me.
58:58 And it bites me in the back of my thigh.
59:01 (roaring) It starts moving around like you're a rag doll.
59:08 (roaring) NARRATOR: Trapped between a raging bear and a 30-foot drop,
59:14 Johan makes a life-and-death decision.
59:17 JOHAN: I have to get into safety and I basically
59:21 dive off the trail into some bushes about 20 feet below.
59:26 NARRATOR: Safe but badly battered, Johan calls for his daughter.
59:30 JOHAN: Jenna, come down here, it's safe down here.
59:33 I don't think Jenna ever heard me.
59:35 NARRATOR: But the grizzly does.
59:38 (roaring) JOHAN: I remember still seeing the bear popping its head up,
59:45 looking down at me, and just running down.
59:48 And this animal has incredible speed.
59:54 (growling) NARRATOR: Within seconds, the bear is back on top of Johan.
1:00:01 JOHAN: The bear's on top of my backpack,
1:00:02 pulling me, back and forth, back and forth,
1:00:04 and it was digging on top of my skull as if, you know, a dog digging for a bone.
1:00:11 I felt the paws on my neck at one point and a lot, a lot of pressure right here.
1:00:17 And it basically cracked some of the vertebrae right there.
1:00:20 I could feel that that was going.
1:00:24 I knew that the bottom of my neck had been broken,
1:00:27 'cause the force of the bear on top of it, I kinda felt something crack.
1:00:31 NARRATOR: Desperate,
1:00:32 Johan believes his only chance at survival is to fight back.
1:00:36 JOHAN: I grabbed it by the throat,
1:00:38 and I remember looking it straight in the eyes
1:00:40 and it looked straight back at me, two amber brown eyes.
1:00:43 I'll never forget that sight.
1:00:45 (roar) Then it bit me in the skull,
1:00:48 and then I could feel a tooth going into the back of my neck.
1:00:53 And that's when I thought, that's just not good.
1:00:55 I'm going to die.
1:00:56 If I'm going to keep playing dead, I'm actually going to be dead.
1:01:05 NARRATOR: Johan decides he must fall again and jumps an additional 30 feet.
1:01:13 The mother grizzly lets Johan go, but turns her attention towards Jenna.
1:01:22 JENNA: I waited in the bush; I don't know how long I waited.
1:01:26 My instinct was to lie there in the bush and cover myself up.
1:01:30 NARRATOR: Jenna Otter hides from the agitated
1:01:33 mother bear that attacked her father.
1:01:35 JENNA: I put myself in the fetal position and thought I was being quiet.
1:01:40 NARRATOR: The grizzly may not hear her, but it can smell her.
1:01:43 JENNA: And I remember distinctly hearing sort
1:01:45 of the under breath, sort of growls.
1:01:48 From there, it just reached down,
1:01:50 like bit me around the head, tore me to the side.
1:01:53 At that point, my mouth was torn completely open.
1:01:55 It bit me on the shoulder and tore me the other way.
1:01:58 (roaring) NARRATOR: Mother bears will react aggressively if
1:02:06 they sense their vulnerable cubs are in danger.
1:02:16 When the threat passes, they'll likely disappear back into the wild.
1:02:24 So almost always, playing dead is the best response.
1:02:31 JENNA: Kinda looked at me over,
1:02:32 sort of saw that I was bloody and I wasn't moving,
1:02:35 not a threat to its cubs, and just walked off.
1:02:40 Yeah.
1:02:42 NARRATOR: Jenna and Johan estimate that their combined
1:02:45 attacks lasted less than five minutes.
1:02:51 Discovered by a passing hiker,
1:02:53 the pair was airlifted to Seattle, Washington, for emergency medical attention.
1:02:58 JENNA: I just couldn't move my arm.
1:02:59 It was because the bite had gone down to the bone.
1:03:02 And my head felt really bloody and caked with blood because
1:03:04 there were some gashes in there from it biting around my face.
1:03:07 And I was so lucky.
1:03:10 NARRATOR: But her father was not.
1:03:14 JOHAN: They had to take care of approximately 28 wounds.
1:03:18 I believe there was six different vertebras that were broken.
1:03:21 Two ribs broken on one side and one rib on the other side.
1:03:24 Also the bear's claws must've hit me in the eye.
1:03:29 Also, the clawing of the bear on my head, it took off 60 to 80% of my scalp.
1:03:40 I lost half my blood while I was on the mountain.
1:03:42 Also, I broke something in here, broke my nose.
1:03:47 (chuckles) NARRATOR: Four weeks and six surgeries later,
1:03:50 Johan was finally released from the hospital.
1:03:55 And with Johan and Jenna's scars comes a newfound
1:03:59 respect for one of the world's deadliest species.
1:04:02 (roar) JOHAN: It's just an amazing animal,
1:04:05 just an amazing amount of muscle all in this one body.
1:04:09 It's just one big piece of muscle, basically, just amazing.
1:04:13 JENNA: I don't feel any ill will towards the grizzly bear,
1:04:16 just grizzly bears in general or the particular
1:04:19 grizzly bear that attacked us at all.
1:04:23 It was doing what it naturally does.
1:04:27 NARRATOR: Despite the sheer volume of hikers
1:04:28 around the United States' national parks,
1:04:31 the number of grizzly attack fatalities is low...
1:04:34 under 50 since the year 1900.
1:04:39 Larger populations of grizzlies live in Alaska and Canada,
1:04:43 where encounters with humans are more common.
1:04:53 British Columbia, Canada, August 1994.
1:04:59 Deep in the forest, Louie van Grootel
1:05:03 and Wade Sjodin are marking high-quality timber for logging.
1:05:10 WADE: Just before 11 o'clock we heard something.
1:05:17 You hear that?
1:05:18 LOUIE: Yeah.
1:05:21 WADE: We heard it was woofing and kind of a bark above us.
1:05:27 And we could hear the sound getting closer.
1:05:30 We had decided, yeah, it was a bear.
1:05:35 NARRATOR: Wade races up a tree.
1:05:38 But Louie isn't so fast.
1:05:40 Suddenly, he's facing a grizzly.
1:05:43 (roaring) With one blow of its paw, the bear shatters his hand.
1:05:54 Its teeth rip into his flesh, all the way to the bone.
1:05:59 (roaring) LOUIE: I grab the bear by the ears, try to reduce his leverage on me.
1:06:07 He ended up picking me right up, it was effortless.
1:06:12 NARRATOR: He weighs 200 pounds and is a former competitive wrestler,
1:06:16 but against this grizzly, Louie has no chance.
1:06:26 Wade watches from above as the bear tears his friend to shreds.
1:06:31 (roaring) WADE: I remember the teeth tearing the scalp off his head,
1:06:40 a sound I'll never forget.
1:06:42 Hey!
1:06:42 Get out of here!
1:06:44 Go!
1:06:44 Get out of here!
1:06:45 Hey!
1:06:45 NARRATOR: Wade yells at the bear hoping to distract it from mauling Louie.
1:06:51 WADE: Hey!
1:06:51 Get out of here!
1:06:53 Hey!
1:06:53 You know, I was, I feared for Louie obviously,
1:06:56 and I thought briefly that I should jump down and...
1:07:06 Then I thought there's no good that I could do to assist at this point,
1:07:13 basically stay in the tree,
1:07:16 try to coerce it, get it to come over to me, to, you know, leave him.
1:07:25 NARRATOR: But he doesn't realize grizzlies can climb.
1:07:29 WADE: To my horror, this bear grabbed on to the tree
1:07:32 with both front feet and just proceeded to pull himself straight up.
1:07:38 NARRATOR: Seconds later, the bear is 35 feet up the tree.
1:07:44 WADE: Having just witnessed what happened to Louie, I mean, it was terror.
1:07:51 (roaring) NARRATOR: Some 30 feet in the air,
1:08:00 Wade Sjodin fights off the grizzly that battered his friend.
1:08:04 The bear claws and pulls.
1:08:07 But Wade has a plan.
1:08:09 Before racing up the tree, Wade removed his vest.
1:08:17 Inside was his only real defense: bear spray,
1:08:23 like the potent mace used by policemen and the military.
1:08:34 Wade drops from the tree...
1:08:41 ...and runs to his vest.
1:08:43 (roaring) (roaring) WADE:
1:08:57 It laid at the bottom of the tree for I don't know how long, just in a big pile.
1:09:02 I looked at it, and I went, god, I killed this thing.
1:09:06 And then it did start to move and slowly kind of got
1:09:11 up and was wheezing really bad and blowing like its nose,
1:09:16 and it started to wander off in the direction from which it'd come.
1:09:21 And if it hadn't been for the mace,
1:09:23 I could almost guarantee you that neither one of us would have survived, so.
1:09:30 NARRATOR: About an hour later, rescuers arrive.
1:09:34 Louie is so badly injured that it takes two
1:09:37 and a half years and 16 surgeries to repair his body.
1:09:44 Most bear attacks happen when humans venture deep into the remote wilderness...
1:09:50 like the Kodiak archipelago, home to the world's largest brown bear.
1:10:01 The Kodiak bear is a giant grizzly.
1:10:09 Males stand around 9 feet high and weigh some 700 pounds.
1:10:20 Yet they can run up to 30 miles per hour,
1:10:23 covering 60 yards of wilderness in 6 seconds.
1:10:33 Their paws are larger than a man's face,
1:10:37 and their curved claws and spike-like teeth can shred an animal in an instant.
1:10:44 These massive bears depend on an annual
1:10:47 cycle of food sources to keep them alive.
1:10:51 In the summer, Kodiaks crave an especially tiny but critical meal: wild berries.
1:11:02 In the fall, they gather near streams waiting
1:11:05 for fatty salmon to arrive back from their migration.
1:11:12 But when climate change causes crops to fail and rivers to run dry...
1:11:19 these hungry bears will pounce on whatever food they can find.
1:11:23 (growling) (man yelling) November 1999.
1:11:37 A party of seasoned hunters ventures into the wilderness to hunt deer.
1:11:45 In the group is 68-year-old Gene Moe, his son Karl,
1:11:51 and two friends— Steve Fitzpatrick and Tom Frolich.
1:11:56 TOM: It seemed like it started out like
1:11:58 any normal day and, and everything was fine.
1:12:01 Everybody seemed to be in good spirits.
1:12:03 STEVE: Happy hunting.
1:12:07 KARL: Typically you want to stay together,
1:12:09 but things happen where you end up alone
1:12:11 or your partner has gone a different direction.
1:12:13 Or you just don't know where each other is at, and you
1:12:16 can go by each other and not see each other sometimes.
1:12:19 NARRATOR: The hunters know the woods well,
1:12:22 and know they have entered a world where danger may lurk behind every tree.
1:12:29 TOM: The thought of being attacked by a bear is in the back of our minds.
1:12:33 But we try to shrug that off because you could just be
1:12:38 wandering around completely paranoid if you kept thinking that all the time.
1:12:44 But the thought's always there.
1:12:47 That's probably the last thing you want to run into on a trail is a bear.
1:12:51 He's gonna win.
1:12:55 NARRATOR: By 2:30, the hunters have hiked a couple of miles into the forest.
1:13:06 (gunshot) And 68-year-old Gene Moe has had some success.
1:13:11 He's killed a deer.
1:13:13 But with it comes the attention of a hungry predator.
1:13:17 (roaring) NARRATOR: Out of nowhere, a Kodiak bear slams into Gene Moe.
1:13:25 The bear's teeth and claws rip into him.
1:13:29 Gene manages to reach for his knife,
1:13:31 and stabs the Kodiak at least three times in the head and neck.
1:13:36 (roaring) Finally, he gets a break, and struggles to his gun.
1:13:44 (gunshot) The bear drops dead.
1:13:51 Gene escaped the surprise attack.
1:13:54 But he's not out of the woods just yet.
1:13:57 Blood pours from deep wounds in his arm and leg.
1:14:01 He needs help, fast.
1:14:05 TOM: It was about 3:30, 4 o'clock.
1:14:10 Hearing the breakers on the beach, just, you know, quiet.
1:14:16 And I hear a noise, and didn't pay much mind, and then I heard it again.
1:14:30 We looked down the end of the beach.
1:14:34 MAN: There he is.
1:14:36 TOM: And there was Gene.
1:14:41 He was covered in blood, his clothes were all ripped to shreds.
1:14:47 All the meat in his arm was hanging down below his hand.
1:14:50 His leg was sliced open where you could see
1:14:53 the pants and the blood and the muscles and everything.
1:14:57 I had not seen anything like that at all.
1:15:00 MAN: Wrap him up.
1:15:09 NARRATOR: The wounded hunter has only one desire— that his death be quick.
1:15:15 TOM: The first thing Gene says, "Shoot me." And I said,
1:15:19 "Gene, I can't do that, but if you ask me tomorrow,
1:15:22 maybe I will." We jumped in the boat, we launched it off and took off.
1:15:33 NARRATOR: They speed toward the nearest hunting lodge, 20 minutes away.
1:15:39 From there, they can radio the Coast Guard for help.
1:15:45 TOM: Sitting in the boat going back, you know,
1:15:47 he starts to, to nod down and that, you wonder,
1:15:50 is he, is he going to be okay or is he going to, or is he going to die?
1:15:55 You know, it was hard to tell.
1:16:00 NARRATOR: Gene is suffering massive trauma, blood loss, and shock.
1:16:11 TOM: All he could say, as I recall, is he was so freezing, he was so cold.
1:16:16 NARRATOR: The boat is traveling at 20 miles an hour.
1:16:20 The air is 20 degrees Fahrenheit.
1:16:24 Inside the boat, the temperature is near zero.
1:16:34 But the extreme cold is actually buying
1:16:36 him precious time by constricting his blood vessels, slowing the loss of blood.
1:16:48 TOM: Next thing we know, here comes the helicopter.
1:16:50 It was the Coast Guard out of Kodiak,
1:16:52 and they landed out on a little peninsula that was there.
1:16:57 NARRATOR: The chopper takes Gene to Kodiak Medical Center.
1:17:02 After six hours of surgery and six weeks of recovery,
1:17:07 Gene is able to reflect on his experience.
1:17:11 GENE: A hundred things could have went wrong and I wouldn't have made it,
1:17:14 but everything just fell into place, just clockwork,
1:17:18 and I was so blessed with how everything came out.
1:17:22 NARRATOR: Gene doesn't blame the bear for what happened to him.
1:17:27 GENE: The bear was starving and needed the meat from the deer,
1:17:31 and if he would have left me, if he would have stopped,
1:17:34 I would have walked away and he would have had that meat.
1:17:38 It came right on me, so I had no chance but to defend myself.
1:17:43 And so we had this fight, there was two of us trying to survive,
1:17:47 and I was very fortunate I was the one that made it.
1:17:51 NARRATOR: Elsewhere in the world, the grizzly is outsized by a distant relative
1:17:57 and the largest land carnivore in the world.
1:18:03 The polar bear evolved from the brown bear some 150,000 years ago.
1:18:09 This king of the Arctic is the world's largest bear.
1:18:18 Adult males can weigh nearly a ton.
1:18:26 And stand over 10 feet tall.
1:18:29 (roaring) Despite their size, they're still fast.
1:18:35 A polar bear can sprint up to 25 miles per hour on land,
1:18:39 and swim at 6 miles per hour underwater.
1:18:44 A polar bear's teeth are closer in many ways
1:18:47 to lions or tigers than to their grizzly cousins.
1:18:50 Meat slicers, not plant grinders.
1:18:53 And so are their claws.
1:18:58 Sharp enough to keep other enormous animals from getting away
1:19:04 and for getting a grip in a slippery world of ice.
1:19:13 A polar bear can detect its prey from over 20 miles away.
1:19:21 Its primary diet is fatty, sea-dependent seals.
1:19:32 The bear uses its weight to bash in the roof of a hidden seal's den.
1:19:39 Then finishes the job with its torpedo-shaped head...
1:19:46 perfect for squeezing into small holes in the ice
1:19:49 and dragging out the heaviest of meals.
1:19:53 (roaring) This Russian video shows a polar bear taking
1:20:01 on a bull walrus— evidence of a polar bear's true power.
1:20:08 A bull walrus can have 3-foot tusks and weigh nearly two tons.
1:20:15 But it's virtually helpless against a polar bear's merciless assault.
1:20:26 Polar bears are found in pockets across the Arctic:
1:20:30 Alaska, Canada, Russia, Greenland, and Norway.
1:20:39 They depend on the sea ice to hunt
1:20:41 for food rich enough in calories to keep them alive.
1:20:45 But as the planet warms because of rising CO2 emissions,
1:20:49 ice melts earlier and takes longer to freeze.
1:20:54 So bears are spending more time on land.
1:20:57 Driven by starvation, they seek new prey wherever they can find it.
1:21:04 ERIN: I definitely felt like I was being hunted.
1:21:11 NARRATOR: Churchill, Canada.
1:21:15 Every fall thousands of polar bears congregate
1:21:18 here in anticipation of the first freeze...
1:21:22 earning this small town the title of Polar Bear Capital of the World.
1:21:28 ERIN: Part of Churchill's beauty is definitely the rawness of the environment.
1:21:35 There's, there's one 4-way stop, you know, there's no traffic.
1:21:39 It's just this sort of untouched area of the world.
1:21:43 NARRATOR: Montreal native Erin Greene first visited Churchill in 2012
1:21:48 to work as a waitress during polar bear season.
1:21:51 ERIN: I liked it so much that I decided to come back
1:21:54 the next year and experience the summer months as well as the winter months.
1:21:59 I had seen my first bear in town the first year, um,
1:22:03 just sort of on the other side of the railroad tracks from the town.
1:22:07 To actually see a bear for the first time myself in town,
1:22:11 I think that that was, um, quite an awakening for me.
1:22:20 NARRATOR: On her second year,
1:22:21 Erin got up close and personal with the town's famous
1:22:26 predator while walking home from a Halloween party with her friends.
1:22:30 ERIN: I left around 5 o'clock in the morning.
1:22:33 I remember it being fairly cold that night.
1:22:37 My house was approximately a block away from the house that the party was at.
1:22:43 The walk should have taken less than 5 minutes.
1:22:46 Then we left their house, took a couple of steps onto the street,
1:22:50 and my friend Nikki happened to look over her right shoulder,
1:22:54 and she said, "Oh, my god, guys.
1:22:56 There's a bear." And then all of us kind
1:22:58 of looked over and saw the bear just running towards us.
1:23:02 NARRATOR: Without a weapon for protection,
1:23:04 Erin and her friends act out of instinct.
1:23:08 ERIN: Our first reaction was to run.
1:23:11 But the bear was so fast.
1:23:13 There was literally nothing that I could do.
1:23:15 NARRATOR: The bear heads straight for Erin, and her friends run for help.
1:23:19 ERIN: The bear grabbed me and bit onto the back of my head.
1:23:22 And I just, I'd never felt anything that violent before.
1:23:26 I tried to punch overhead and just try to get it in a sensitive area.
1:23:31 But I was just being overpowered by the bear.
1:23:34 NARRATOR: Erin's punches don't faze the giant polar bear.
1:23:38 ERIN: At that point, he picked me up from the shoulders.
1:23:41 I was a good 5 feet off the ground.
1:23:45 It was a blur of paws.
1:23:49 I was just like a rag doll and being tossed around.
1:23:52 If I was going to get out of this situation,
1:23:55 I would need somebody to come and help me.
1:23:57 NARRATOR: Erin's losing blood fast.
1:24:00 Her world begins to fade.
1:24:02 ERIN: When I looked around, I couldn't see anyone.
1:24:04 It's me and the bear.
1:24:06 And this isn't a fight that I'm going to win.
1:24:10 At that point, I don't think I was screaming anymore.
1:24:13 MAN: Hey!
1:24:14 Hey!
1:24:15 ERIN: All of a sudden, I start to hear a man's voice.
1:24:18 MAN: Hey, get out of here!
1:24:19 ERIN: The polar bear dropped me.
1:24:21 And somebody was distracting the bear.
1:24:23 This was my chance to get away.
1:24:26 And so I remember looking up and seeing a bright light,
1:24:31 which was the doorway of the man's house,
1:24:34 and I thought, I have to get inside that house.
1:24:37 And I ran for it.
1:24:39 NARRATOR: Erin musters what little strength she has left and runs to safety.
1:24:43 ERIN: And actually as I was running, I tripped.
1:24:46 Because I didn't realize that the bear had ripped open my knee.
1:24:51 But I just got right back up and just ran like hell.
1:24:55 And I'm pressing my scalp into my head because
1:24:57 I'm pretty sure that if I take my hand off
1:25:01 that I'm either going to bleed to death or that part
1:25:04 of my head is just going to fall off.
1:25:06 NARRATOR: Erin hears screams behind her as she
1:25:09 finally makes it to the open door.
1:25:10 ERIN: I remember going up the stairs of the house,
1:25:15 I remember the yellow glow of the light.
1:25:18 My thoughts were I need to get to a phone immediately,
1:25:21 and I need to call for more help.
1:25:37 ERIN: As I'm inside, there's lots of gunshots going off.
1:25:40 There's just people screaming,
1:25:42 and this whole chaotic situation that was happening outside.
1:25:48 This lady comes down the stairs in a bathrobe,
1:25:52 and she sees me bleeding uncontrollably from my head.
1:25:57 I tell her that I was just attacked by a polar bear.
1:26:00 She says, "Okay, we need to get you into the bathroom." And then
1:26:03 she tells me that she's a nurse and that I need to trust her.
1:26:07 NARRATOR: The woman wraps a towel around Erin's
1:26:10 head as they wait for an ambulance to arrive.
1:26:13 Shortly after, the gunshots and screams cease from outside.
1:26:17 (siren) ERIN: My scalp was partially removed,
1:26:24 and the bear, polar bear had severed three arteries.
1:26:27 He took a piece of my ear off.
1:26:30 I had bruising pretty much all over my body.
1:26:33 I had a concussion.
1:26:35 I had puncture wounds in my shoulders, a little bit across my chest.
1:26:42 The polar bear also scratched my belly.
1:26:45 Um, and, uh, cut open my knee.
1:26:49 NARRATOR: Erin's injuries resulted in more than $13,000 in medical bills.
1:26:54 But her love for bears and the city of Churchill remains the same.
1:26:59 ERIN: One of the first questions was if the bear was okay.
1:27:02 I later found out that not only the polar bear that attacked me died that night,
1:27:06 but unfortunately they killed another bear as well that evening.
1:27:11 We live in a town that there's
1:27:13 the potential that polar bears can come into town.
1:27:17 That's part of the charm that Churchill and people who live in Churchill have.
1:27:23 We've created a system where we can both live in harmony.
1:27:28 When you're dealing with the world's largest carnivore and a town
1:27:35 of 800 people that basically is the migratory path of polar bears,
1:27:42 then eventually something's gotta give.
1:27:47 NARRATOR: The world's last surviving bears are on the fight of their lives,
1:27:52 reacting to human threats to their species' survival.
1:27:56 As our planet changes, the world's predators are fighting back,
1:28:02 to take back what was and will always be wild.