Breaking news: One hunter killed, two injured in polar bear attack in Foxe Basin

A man from Naujaat, Nunavut (formerly Repulse Bay) has been killed by a polar bear and her cub, and his two hunting companions injured. The party was found today by a search and rescue team on White Island, southeast of Naujaat after they were reported overdue home on Sunday. A total of five bears were destroyed at the scene: the female and her cub responsible for the attack, plus three other bears attracted to the site and still present when rescuers arrived. This is the second fatal polar bear attack in Nunavut this summer (see previous post here). A very sad day indeed.

Foxe Basin polar_bears_rowley_island_Stapleton 2012 press photo labeled sm

Excerpts from news reports below and more details to follow on this incident as they become available. Map below shows location of Naujaat, with White Island about 100 km southeast (off Southampton Island):

Naujaat location_Foxe Basin_Google maps

According to the CBC (28 August 2018), five polar bears were destroyed following the attack [my bold]:

“A man from Nunavut has been killed in a polar bear attack, according to officials.

He was attacked by a mother polar bear and her cub, said Solomon Malliki, the mayor of Naujaat, the northern community from which the man and two other hunters set out last week.

The other hunters were injured in the attack.

The mother and cub were destroyed at the scene, Malliki said, as were three other bears who were attracted to the area in the following days.

…

It was not immediately clear when the attack happened.

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The three hunters left Naujaat last week to go caribou and narwhal hunting, according the RCMP. They didn’t return on Thursday as planned and were reported overdue on Sunday.

Malliki said they’d been hampered by bad weather and mechanical problems.

On Monday, the Canadian Armed Forces Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Trenton, Ont., organized a search and rescue mission with Nunavut authorities and local community searchers.

A Hercules aircraft and multiple boats from Naujaat began searching, the statement said, but the team was not able to reach the location where they believed the hunters were, because ice was blocking their path.

Earlier Tuesday, a second Hercules aircraft and a coast guard icebreaker, CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent, joined the search effort.

The men were located on White Island, some 100 kilometres southeast of Naujaat, by the icebreaker’s helicopter, according to a spokesperson for the coast guard and Fisheries and Oceans Canada.

“We are saddened by this incident and send our thoughts and condolences to the families involved,” said Lauren Solski in an email.

The name of the dead man has not been released.”