Grizzly bears are fast. Very fast. Just look at this large bear patrolling his favorite watering hole in Katmai National Park and Preserve. He’s placidly padding around one minute, and a split second later he’s charging along the water towards the person holding the camera at twenty miles an hour. Just looking at the footage is enough to raise the hair on your neck.
Happily for the people gathered to view the bears, it seems to be a bluff charge, or perhaps he was startled by another bear in the brush behind him. At any rate, at the last moment the bear breaks off his dash, turning and walking around the people gathered at the shore. In one surreal moment the camera captures the image of the bear in the viewfinder of someone else’s digital camera.
The short video illustrates the astonishing speed of which these animals are capable and, by extension, the inadvisability of attempting to run from bears; unless you’re Usain Bolt, they will outrun you. And we’re guessing they could probably outrun Usain Bolt, too.
The bears in Katmai Preserve are well known for their comfort with humans, but this big male is not above being irritated at human proximity. For the folks who got to see the bear enter, well, beast mode, it was a once in a lifetime event the won’t soon forget. Check out the lady at the end of the footage, who is either spectacularly calm in the face of that much ill-intentioned furry flesh flying at her, or is in shock.
See the frankly ridiculously scary video below.