Arizona Sees 3 Bear Attacks in a Month

Most recent victim in critical condition
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Jun 26, 2012 1:25 PM CDT
Arizona Sees 3 Bear Attacks in a Month
A young black bear is seen grazing near the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center on Saturday, June 23, 2012, in Juneau, Alaska.   (AP Photo/Becky Bohrer)

Since 1990, there have been just 10 bear attacks in Arizona—and three of those occurred in the past month. Most recently, 30-year-old Peter Baca was attacked at a campground in the Tonto National Forest on Sunday; he is in critical condition, ABC News reports. Before that, a woman was clawed on May 31 at the same campground when a bear entered her tent, and a man was bit on the leg as he slept in an unfinished cabin just a few miles from the campground last week; neither injury is life-threatening.

"It looked like it was a baby bear, he was so skinny. I think he was starving," says a fellow camper who witnessed Sunday's attack. A rep from the Arizona Game and Fish Department says bear attacks usually happen when environmental conditions are extreme, adding that drought conditions may have forced the bears into human areas to look for food. Two bears have been tracked and killed by rangers, but it's not yet clear if either was responsible for Sunday's attack. (More animal attack stories.)

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