ANCHORAGE, AK (KTUU/CNN) – An Alaskan man’s quick thinking and a 6-year-old can of bear spray saved his friend from a bear attack.
Alex Ippoliti and his friend James Fredrick were riding bicycles in Anchorage, AK, Saturday morning when they heard noises coming from the bushes.
"We didn't really know what was happening, so we slowed down. We didn't stop and nothing happened, so we picked up speed and tried to keep going,” Ippoliti said.
Not long afterward, a brown bear jumped out of the bushes.
“I was leading and he was trailing me. We were only a couple yards apart, and the bear jumped out and grabbed him and pulled him off of his bike,” Ippoliti said.
Ippoliti tried yelling at the bear to make it go away, but it didn’t work. Then, the man remembered a canister of bear spray he’s been carrying with him on outdoor adventures for the past six years.
"I pulled it out from inside the bag and walked towards her and yelled at her, so she dropped him and walked towards me. Then I sprayed her, and… the trigger actually got stuck, so just the whole can basically went at her. As soon as she tasted it though, she ran back into the woods,” Ippoliti said.
As Ippoliti went to help his friend, he saw a second bear in a nearby tree.
"I looked up and saw in one of the spruce trees close to us near the top another bear, and it took me a minute to realize it was a second bear. That's when I realized that it was a cub with a sow,” he said.
Fredrick remained conscious, even though he was injured, and guided his friend through what to do next, Ippoliti says
“He kept saying, ‘We need to move.’ He was very calm the whole time, so we moved about a quarter of a mile away. During that time, I was able to call 911. We were really, really fortunate that there was cell service,” Ippoliti said.
As Fredrick recovers in the hospital, Ippoliti says he’s thankful they were together when the bear attacked, and he’s considering keeping the empty bear spray can as a reminder.
"I really think I'm alive because of it. I really do,” he said.
Copyright 2017 KTUU, Alex Ippoliti via CNN. All rights reserved.
