Terrifying moment bear chases skier down mountain as chairlift passengers scream warnings before he distracts it by hurling his rucksack onto the snow
- Footage shows the young tourist skiing for his life as the brown bear chases him
- The incident took place at a ski resort in Predeal, Romania, over the weekend
- Quick thinking victim throws his backpack on the ground to distract the bear
This is the nightmare moment a skier is chased down the mountain by a bear as chairlift passengers watch on in horror.
Footage shows the young tourist skiing for his life as the brown bear follows him down the slope at speed, at a ski resort in Predeal, Romania, over the weekend.
Videos of the pursuit were posted to social media, with passengers on the nearby chairlift heard screaming and warning the man to keep fleeing.
One passenger can be heard shouting: ‘Come on, the bear is chasing you! Faster! God forbid, don’t look back!’, Romania Insider reports.
The man appeared to be struggling to maintain his momentum down the slope as those on the chairlift tried to help him by whistling and shouting to scare the bear.
Eventually the quick thinking victim throws his backpack on the ground, distracting the bear just long enough for him to get to safety.
Three calls reporting bear sightings had been made on the day, with one of the calls about the very slope where the chase took place, the mountain gendarmes told digi24.
The slope was reported to be closed at the time of the incident.
Footage shows the tourist skiing for his life as the brown bear follows down the slope at speed, at a ski resort in Predeal, Romania, over the weekend
The bear is seen sprinting through the snow towards the young skier as he flees for his life
A spokesperson for the county inspectorate of gendarmerie, Ion Zaharia, told Digi24 that the man had done the right thing by preoccupying the bear with the discarded backpack.
He added that the potentially fatal incident was not out of the ordinary for this time of year and that fewer reports had been made in the past year than in previous years.
Following the incident authorities in Brașov issued two Ro-Alert messages, to warn residents of the area of the danger.
Chairlift passengers who filmed the incident from above shouted ‘Come on, the bear is chasing you! Faster! God forbid, don’t look back!’
They also tried to help the skier by whistling and shouting to scare the bear off
In the week before the incident another report of a bear on a slope at the nearby Clăbucet resort had been made.
Mountain gendarmes arrived in an all-terrain vehicle to drive the bear into the forest, they are now working to relocate the bear to another area.
Around 6,000 brown bears, which are the same species as grizzly bears are known to live in Romania.
It is currently legal to hunt brown bears in Romania, a measure which was brought in by the government in 2019 in an attempt to control the animal’s population.