The romantic hike turned into a bloody drama.
Friday evening, a 31-year-old Belarusian woman and her 29-year-old companion were walking in the mountains of the Low Tatras National Park, in Slovakia, when the couple found themselves face to face with a bear, reports the BBC.
Panicked, they both left in opposite directions and it was the young woman that the bear decided to follow in the middle of this thick forest, the mountain rescue service told the local press, based on the companion's story.
The rescuers were alerted very quickly by the latter, but unfortunately arrived too late.
An open investigation
The latter, accompanied by a dog and equipped with drones, found the body of the thirty-year-old at the bottom of one of the multiple ravines, without being able to determine whether it was the bear that killed her or whether she lost his life in his fall.
When they arrived, the bear was still near the body and fled, frightened by the rescue dog, as well as by a shot fired as a warning.
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The victim's companion was found at the top of the ravine, safe and sound but shocked.
An investigation to determine the causes of this death has been opened.
Although the presence of these ursids in the Slovak mountains has been common for decades, deaths relating to their attacks remain rare.
Two years ago, the first fatal attack of the century occurred in central Slovakia, recalls the BBC.
A bear attack in the city
Two days after this tragedy, another bear attack occurred in the town of Liptovský Mikuláš, not far from the Low Tatras National Park.
This time a bear found itself in the middle of an urban area.
In images posted on social networks, we can see the animal running, even leaping, in the middle of the city.
A bear has been filmed running down a street before it attacked two people in a town in Slovakia.
According to local officials, a 49-year-old woman suffered a shoulder injury while a 72-year-old man had a gash on his head.
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In one of them, we can see him attacking a local resident who was on a sidewalk.
A 49-year-old woman was injured in the shoulder and a 72-year-old man was hit in the head, the local BBC correspondent reported, citing the authorities.
“Based on a call to the emergency line, we sent two ambulances to the city center, where the presence of the bear had been reported,” local emergency services said on their Facebook page, adding that two injured “were reported conscious” then “transported to hospital”.
The police then intervened to chase the bear away, forcing it to return to its mountain.
According to Slovak researchers, the current population of ursids in the country remains stable, at around 1,275 specimens.