Teens talk about bear attack that mauled four

PALMER — Shane Garlock can still hear the screaming in his head.

Two days after surviving an attack by a bear attack that mauled four of a group of seven teens hiking in the Talkeetna Mountains, Garlock said the sounds are still fresh.

“Whenever I tell this, I usually outline the screaming that I could hear from my friends and the growls from the bear, which were loud and deep,” he said. “The screamings were just helpless screaming, and I can still hear it in my head.”

Along with seeing his companions covered in blood and the chaos of the attack’s aftermath, Garlock said his memories of Saturday’s attack are still vivid.

He said he remembers the aftermath of the attack, “seeing my friends’ faces with blood on it, but eyes were perfectly clean — perfect blue eyes just seemed to stand out, and that’s another thing that really freaked me out.”

Garlock was one of seven members of a National Outdoor Leadership School group who had completed about 24 days of intense outdoors survival training in Alaska before a random encounter a little before 9:30 p.m., Saturday with what Alaska State Troopers report was a brown bear. He joined three others from the group Monday at the NOLS office near Palmer to talk about the attack, while two teens from the group remain hospitalized.

The attack happened about 34 miles east of Mile 143 of the Parks Highway near Chulitna, AST reports.

In line with his friends, Noah Allaire, 16, of Albuquerque, N.M., said while the attack was about five to seven minutes of sheer terror, the worst part of the ordeal was the more than seven hours the group waited for help to arrive.

“I would agree that the aftermath and the wait were scarier than the attack itself, even though that seems hard to fathom,” Allaire said. “Just not knowing or being unsure whether help was coming was definitely more scary for me than the attack itself.”

With his left hand wrapped in fresh gauze and a large head wound freshly stitched, Allaire related the events leading up to the attack. He was second in line and said he believes the hikers and bear surprised each other.

“We were backpacking along a narrow gully, basically, with a stream in the middle and we came upon a bear as we walked around, like a little rock outcropping,” he said. “The bear began to attack, basically. I was hiking second in the group after one other student, and so the other student and myself saw the bear immediately, but the bear began attacking him because he was first.”

There was virtually no warning, Allaire said.

“I believe we startled the bear, and so when grizzly bears are startled, they attack,” he said. “We also believe the bear was a mother and there was a cub present as well. So, the bear was acting in defense of its cub.”

The defensive bear attacked four of the hikers before one of them kicked it, which seemed to stop the attack, said Simeon “Sam” Melman, a 17-year-old from Huntington, N.Y.

Along with Melman, Allaire and Garlock — a 16-year-old from Pittsford, N.Y. — Westport, Conn., resident Samuel Boas, 16, joined his friends for Monday’s press conference. Also in the group were Joshua Berg, 17, of New City, N.Y., Samuel Gottsegan, 17, of Denver, Colo., and Victor Martin, an 18-year-old from Richmond, Calif.

Melman was behind most of the others on a small hill and said watching the attack was a surreal experience.

“I thought it was some nightmare I might be having, because it was pretty … it was kind-of hazy due to the adrenaline,” he said. “I do remember standing up there helplessly, basically watching as this bear chased everyone around and eventually ran up the hill.”

He also described the ordeal as “one of the most terrifying things that ever happened in my life. I have to agree that about 20 minutes from the end of the attack, just the chaos, disbelief and the confusion that was going on was overwhelming to handle.”

Though they may have been overwhelmed emotionally, the youths performed well under the pressure of an emergency situation, said Don Ford, Alaska director for NOLS. He said two of the group of seven are still hospitalized, one in serious and the other in stable condition. Another NOLS group that had been out in the wilderness was also located and brought in, he said.

“I think they did exceptionally well,” he said. “I think it’s something that, as you all heard, is very, very challenging to have that kind of trauma. The fact that they were able to respond with good first aid treatment, knew that they needed to get shelter and dry clothes on and set themselves up for a longer-term stay … I think was very commendable.”

Although the attack left the group with injuries that ranged from life-threatening to minor, they pulled together to treat themselves, activate a personal locator beacon and wait for help to arrive, Ford said.

When the Alaska Air National Guard and Alaska State Troopers arrived, they relayed to Ford they were “very impressed” with the level of emergency survival skills displayed.

That some of the youths had previous first aid and emergency medical training also was key, he said. Allaine is a lifeguard and Boas works in emergency medical response.

Garlock said Boas’ experience was crucial in helping keep everyone calm, triage the injured and get them treated.

“He directed us a lot on what to do, to check pulse every 10 minutes, to keep them awake,” he said. “I feel like if we did not have that kind of information, it definitely would not have been better, and a couple of kids could’ve actually died.”

For Boas, the reaction was instinct that also proves the value of good training. He choked up a little while analyzing the situation.

“We sort of looked at each other and, at least I thought to myself, we have our friends’ lives in our hands. This is no time for us to not know what we’re doing. We have to be on top of this, and if we do something wrong, it could cost them their lives. The connections we made were just too strong, and we knew we had to save them.”

Following the attack and rendering first aid to his companions, the hours-long wait was finally broken by the sound of a helicopter.

“Thank God,” Allaire recalls thinking. “More than anything, I think that was just like a huge sense of relief that the beacon has worked. … We had been there for seven-plus hours and it was hard. When I heard the helicopter, I was extremely relieved.”

During the ordeal, which included being mauled, Allaire said he never feared for his life.

“At that point (following the attack), I was more concerned for the health of my companions,” he said. “When the bear attacked me, I was not thinking — I didn’t think I was going to die. That thought didn’t cross my mind at that time.”

What crossed Garlock’s mind was Allaire’s actions.

Although injured and bleeding, he said Allaire immediately started working to help those more seriously injured rather than looking out for himself.

“He had been beaten up pretty much, like a lot,” Garlock said. “But I was so amazed at how, even though he was hurt, he knew that there were other people in more need of help, and the fact that he put them before himself is just an amazing trait. Overall, the highlight of that was Noah.”

The seven who didn’t know each other until less than a month ago now share an experience few can fathom. They also share a bond of friendship that can only come from surviving a life-threatening situation together, they said.

“I don’t really know how I’d describe our relationship,” Boas said. “I think we’re more than really good friends. We’ve been through something that I don’t think anybody can say that they’ve been through. We have some connection that goes beyond words.”

Contact Greg Johnson at greg.johnson@frontiersman.com or 352-2269.