A bear killed a motorcyclist in Romania on Thursday. The animal pulled the man off his motorcycle and dragged him into a ravine.
The man was riding through the Carpathian Mountains and stopped at a tourist spot on the Transfagarasan road. There, a brown bear attacked him. The animal dragged the motorcyclist into a ravine 80 meters deep.
When emergency services arrived, the man was already dead, writes BBC News. He reportedly had serious injuries. Nothing has been released about his identity.
Bear attacks occur more often in Romania. In twenty years, bears have killed around thirty people, writes the Romanian Ministry of Environment.
The number of bear attacks is increasing because the animals’ habitat is further shrinking due to construction work, logging, and climate change. As a result, the animals are used to looking for food in cities.
Romania has a population of more than ten thousand brown bears, writes news agency Reuters. Authorities are struggling to protect residents and tourists in mountain villages from the animals.