True bear attack stories from across North America, told in full 🐻 Each episode reconstructs a real encounter: the place, the people, the bear, and the split…
10:128K views · 12h ago · 10:12
On Halloween 2026, Jenny Balcarras, 48, and her daughter Selah Reed, 20, went for a walk on a trail near their home in Bella Coola, British Columbia. They never came home. This video breaks down what is known about the search, what investigators found, and the questions that remain, including how many bears were involved.
33:531.9K views · 2d ago · 33:53
Elizabeth Ford says she woke up on a couch in Fouke, Arkansas, to find a hairy, clawed arm reaching through her window. In British Columbia, a prospector named Albert Ostman claimed something carried him off inside his own sleeping bag.
10:294.4K views · 3d ago · 10:29
On October 1, 2016, Todd Orr was scouting for elk in Montana's Madison Range when a sow grizzly with two cubs charged him from a ridge. He emptied his bear spray, survived the first attack, and started walking out. A few minutes later, the same bear came back.
27:2712K views · 4d ago · 27:27
Four bizarre bear attacks, and every single victim survived. From the attack that inspired Troy Hurtubise to build a bear-proof suit, to Justin Bieber music that stopped a brown bear attack, two wrestlers who fought off a grizzly bear, and a zoo attack that shows why you never tease a bear, these are some of the strangest survival stories we've covered.
Topics: The Bear Attack That Inspired Troy Hurtubise's Bear-Proof Suit · Justin Bieber Music Stops Brown Bear Attack · Two Wrestlers Fight a Grizzly Bear · Why You Never Tease a Bear
11:4212K views · 1w ago · 11:42
At 3:30 in the morning on October 2, 2026, a black bear pulled open the faulty back door of a home in Salmon, Idaho. Brian Heidemann had no weapon, only a few seconds, and his wife and daughters standing within ten feet of it. He tackled the bear back into the yard, and by the time he got inside again he was telling his wife goodbye. Two more bears were still outside, trying to get in.
35:112.3K views · 1w ago · 35:11
Five miners under siege in a cabin at midnight. A six-year-old boy gone from a Smoky Mountains trail. Nine experienced hikers who cut their way out of their own tent in the dead of a Russian winter. Three true stories from the deep woods, and every one of them still has people arguing.
Topics: The Siege at Ape Canyon (Mount St. Helens, 1924) · The Disappearance of Dennis Martin (Great Smoky Mountains, 1969) · The Dyatlov Pass Incident (Ural Mountains, 1959)
10:0822K views · 2w ago · 10:08
A grizzly sow charged out of the timber on Signal Mountain in Grand Teton National Park and was on top of Shayne Burke before he could fire his bear spray. When her jaws closed on the back of his neck, they closed on his hands, and on the can inside them. It burst in her mouth, and she ran. This is the full story of how a photographer looking for owls survived one of the strangest bear attacks in the park’s history.
11:0811K views · 2w ago · 11:08
On May 4, 2026, a hiker on Yellowstone's Mystic Falls Trail near Old Faithful followed fresh grizzly tracks and found a bloody hat, a watch, and a voice calling for help. Two brothers, ages twenty-eight and fifteen, had been mauled by a sow grizzly with cubs. The older brother called 911 and then helped the younger one. Both were flown to Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center.
11:2750K views · 1mo ago · 11:27
Guest: Joe Pendry Died
Joe Pendry was elk calling in British Columbia's Columbia Valley when a sow grizzly with two cubs came out of the timber instead of a bull elk. He got one shot into her leg before she reached him — and somehow, he survived the mauling that followed. For a while, it looked like he'd beaten the odds twice: once against the bear, and once against his own injuries. Then, three weeks later, everything changed again. This is his story, and the bear's.
9:056.1K views · 1mo ago · 9:05
At four in the morning, Jeff Wilson let his dog out and a bear that had gotten cornered in his backyard charged him, breaking two of his ribs. His French bulldog Cassie, all seven and a half years of her, charged the bear right back and got herself grabbed instead, buying the family the seconds they needed to fight it off with a potted plant, a patio chair, and a patio heater. Jeff and his wife Mallory both survived with serious injuries. Cassie didn't make it.
29:0281K views · 1mo ago · 29:02
Valerie Theoret was walking her ten-month-old daughter Adele to a trapline just twenty minutes from their remote Yukon cabin — a walk she'd made dozens of times that season. She never made it back. An eighteen-year-old grizzly, starving and in constant pain from porcupine quills lodged in its stomach, had been tracking a snowmobile trail to that exact trail all morning, and it was already in position, waiting.
Topics: The Bear That Ate Mr. Leach's Sons · This Bear Attacked and Ate Patrick Madura While He Slept In His Tent · This Bear Killed and Ate Two People · The Bear That Ate Lance Crosby
10:096.5K views · 1mo ago · 10:09
Guest: Snezhana Korolyova
She said yes to a proposal on a camping trip along Russia's Biya River. Less than a day later, a Siberian brown bear tore through her tent in the middle of the night and dragged her across the river while her fiance and nearby campers could only watch. What happened next — including why local officials reportedly held back from shooting the bear even after they had the chance — is one of the more unsettling stories we've covered.
11:426.8K views · 1mo ago · 11:42
Early Sunday morning in Durango, Colorado, a black bear climbed onto an outdoor couch, tore the screen off a 17-year-old girl's cracked bedroom window, and climbed inside. She pulled the blankets over her head and stayed still as the bear sniffed around her — until it swiped at her through the covers, leaving scratches and bruising, before she stood up and screamed it out of the room. It came back once more before finally leaving for good.
9:2824K views · 1mo ago · 9:28
Hrishikesh Koloth, a 27-year-old MMA fighter originally from Kerala, India, had built a new life in Canada — training at Skoden Martial Arts, with a boxing-coach job lined up in Vancouver for June 2026. Instead, on May 8, 2026, he was killed by a black bear while working as a technician at the remote Zoo Bay property near Nordbye Lake, deep in Saskatchewan's Athabasca Basin — nearly 850 kilometers northeast of Saskatoon.
1:17:1239K views · 1mo ago · 1:17:12
Guest: Monthly Marathon
Every last Friday, we compile the most intense bear encounters from our archives into one uninterrupted marathon. This 77-minute collection brings together classic stories of survival, danger, and nature's most powerful predator. Great for background listening or falling asleep to.
Showing the 15 most recent episodes. Everything plays right here on The Pod Atlas.
Have thoughts about Scary Bear Attacks? Share them with other listeners.
Write a review