iStockphoto
Polar bears are known for being a bit more aggressive towards humans than other members of their species, although attacks are relatively rare in the grand scheme of things. However, one man in Norway narrowly avoided what had the potential to be a very brutal outcome when he was forced to flee on a snowmobile during a scary incident that was captured on video.
Most people will never have to worry about coming face-to-face with a polar bear in the wild, as you usually need to go out of your way to end up in the remote locations they call home.
There are five countries—Canada, Russia, Greenland, Norway, and the United States—that boast polar bears within their borders, but as the name suggests, you’re not going to encounter them unless you end up in the vicinity of the Arctic Circle.
That reality means incidents where humans have been attacked by polar bears are fairly uncommon; there were just 73 recorded instances between 1870 and 2014 (resulting in 20 deaths and 63 injuries), and the bulk of those were blamed on “nutritionally stressed adult males” who decided a human might make a solid meal.
Experts assert that climate change has the potential to exacerbate attacks as hungry polar bears are forced to spend more time on land (and closer to populated settlements) due to the depletion of sea ice that frequently serves as a hunting ground, which means people who live in areas they’re already known to frequent need to be even more prepared.
Residents of Pyramiden, a town in Norway located on the Svalbard archipelago that was a Soviet coal camp before being turned into a tourist destination, are no strangers to the estimated 3,000 polar bears that roam the area.
That includes one that was responsible for the wild scene that unfolded shortly after midnight on Sunday when a man who attempted to fire a flare at a polar bear in his vicinity found it charging at him as a result before firing a shot with the rifle he dropped prior to hopping on the snowmobile he used to speed away in the nick of time.
An eyewitness captured the moment a man chose to drop his gun and try to outrun a charging polar bear on a snowmobile in the Arctic town of Pyramiden on the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard. pic.twitter.com/rzoePST9YK
— ABC News (@ABC) April 29, 2025
According to USA Today, the man subsequently took shelter in a nearby pickup truck as other people attempted to scare the polar bear away by honking on car horns, but it didn’t leave the area until raiding another snowmobile for some food it chowed down on before leaving town.
That was a close one.