Animal attacks are not something most of us think about every day, but they can be really scary and have serious effects that last a long time.
Even though humans are at the top of the food chain, we can feel pretty helpless when we are out in nature without the right tools or weapons.
Take Jeremy Evans, for example. He went into the woods in Alberta, Canada, to hunt for a ram but ended up facing something much bigger and more dangerous, which almost cost him his life.
On August 24, 2017, Jeremy, who works as a maintenance supervisor, went into the Rockies of Alberta, Canada. While he was hiding among the trees, he spotted a Bighorn Ram through his binoculars.
Soon after, Jeremy saw “a little brown thing” dash right in front of him, “less than 10 feet away.” He quickly realized it was a grizzly bear cub.
“I knew exactly what it was. I had this just feeling of… I knew I was in trouble,” he said, according to Noiser.
“With grizzly bears, usually, the cubs are running around while the mom is right behind them. So, I figured that Mom was nearby, and I knew trouble was on its way.”
An experienced hunter familiar with the area, Jeremy quickly dug into his pack to grab his bear spray. But before he could get it, the mother bear burst out of the bushes.
“As I turned to look, their mama was about four feet away,” he said, according to Noiser. “Her right front paw was stretched out. I could see her claws, the whites of her eyes, and the left side of her mouth was slightly open as she charged at me…”
Jeremy threw his bike at her, giving himself a chance to run to a nearby tree. He started to climb, but the bear charged again and grabbed his leg with her claws while he hung from a branch.
What happened next was a terrible attack that caused Jeremy serious injuries.
“My left eye was hanging out of the socket. It was looking down. To really see, I had to either lift my eye up or tilt my head way back,” he shared with the Daily Mail.
“I remember touching my face and everything felt different. My jaw was drooping on the left side and all my teeth were showing.”
The harm to Jeremy’s face was so bad that he had to pick up pieces of flesh from the ground after the bear had gone away.
“I remember searching around the mountainside and I found a big piece of flesh. I could feel the bristles and hair, and it was from the right side of my scalp.”
Thinking he was going to die from his injuries, Jeremy made the choice to end his life instead of slowly bleeding out. According to the Daily Mail, he pointed his rifle at himself and pulled the trigger.
But the gun didn’t go off.
“That kind of freaked me out a little bit,” he said. “So that’s when I decided I was going to try to make it out.”
After starting his walk back down the mountain, Jeremy tripped and rolled 200 feet into a rocky creek.
Step by painful step, he finally managed to find a campsite, but there was no one there. He took out his phone and decided to write messages to his wife in case he didn’t make it.
“If anyone finds this, please tell my wife I did my best,” one of the messages shared with UNILAD said. “But there’s no way, that bear really messed me up.”
In another message, he mentioned: “I think this is it. I’m really exhausted and feel like I might pass out. If I do, I won’t wake up.”
In a surprising turn of events, he managed to get to his car and drove 22km to get help. Overall, he had to go through five major surgeries and 15 minor ones, spending five weeks in the hospital.
According to the Mail, Jeremy still has limited movement in some parts, can’t completely close his eyes, and doesn’t have tear ducts anymore.
On top of that, he has been dealing with PTSD for years because of the attack, with triggers often being sounds like ice cracking and the smell of blood.
Even after everything, Jeremy is still an enthusiastic hunter. He now travels around the world as a motivational speaker and has written a book called Mauled, which tells the story of his survival.
