Scared Wild Black Bear Crashes into Knoxville Home Unannouced-May Face Death Penalty

The Knoxville News Sentinel today reported a scared, wild, black bear crashed into a Knoxville home unannounced.

A couple who were walking with their dog came upon the bear and the dog’s barking scared the bear so badly that it panicked and crashed into a nearby home through a front glass door.

The couple reported the lady in the home started screaming bloody murder and apparently the bear chased her around her living room before escaping back out the door.

It sounded like a humorous story until I read what the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency has planned for the bear.

They have set traps for the bear and TWRA supervisor Brian Ripley said if the bear is caught, it is not a candidate for relocation.

The wild black bear would be euthanized.

Ripley said, “A bear like this, you don’t want to get it to get older and larger and get more emboldened around people. We know what happens when animals like bears lose all fear of humans. Generally humans lose the fight.”

According to the description the bear appears to be a yearling, weighing less than 100 pounds.

Ripley stressed that situations like this can be avoided if households do not provide food outside for creatures and properly contain garbage.

Well, Mr. Ripley, I think you have your facts backwards. Obviously the young bear was petrified and was not thinking about food at the time. He was trying to get away from the dog. Why aren’t the people fined that leave food outside or do not properly contain their garbage? Of course a bear will become acclimated to humans if they continue to feed them.

If the scared young black bear should be caught, there has to be an alternative to euthanizing.