Bear Attacks Woman, Buries Her Alive For Next Meal — How Did She Survive?

Natalya Pasternak was enjoying a nice walk with her dog and her friend five weeks ago when she suddenly found herself mauled and attacked by a bear that savaged her legs. In fact, the situation was so dire for Pasternark that she was buried alive by the bear for its next meal.

The entire incident unfolded in a Siberian wood, and 55-year-old Pasternak has now opened up about the horrifying incident that left her on the verge of death.

Pasternak has admitted that, as she fought off the bear with her hands, she screamed a prayer, while explaining that as she tried to escape “the predator started to tear [her] legs apart.”

Pasternak had travelled to the woods to collect birch sap with her dog and her 80-year-old friend, Valentina Gorodetskaya. But this delightful excursion was rudely interrupted by the arrival of the bear. It’s believed that the dog had tried to warn the two women about the bear by barking, but that proved to be too late.

Speaking to the Siberian Times, Pasternak explained that when she originally locked eyes with the bear, she immediately tried to escape, only to stop still once she’d remembered about her friend. This proved to be a grave error, though, because “that was the moment when the predator attacked.”

Pasternak tried to stop the attack though, explaining, “The animal started to tear my legs apart and I tried to attack him [using] something I was using to collect birch sap.”

However, even in this moment of utter chaos, Pasternak was struck by a sobering realization: “Then a quick thought hit me: ‘If the bear takes my legs, I’ll be disabled for the rest of my life. It’s better to die then to be a burden to my children’.”

As this all unfolded, Valentina also tried to ward off the bear with a stick, while Pasternak aimed to hit the bear’s eyes and neck. But the bear proved to be too powerful.

The bear then took aim upon Valentina, which is when she retreated to call the emergency services. At this point, the bear began to bury Natalya Pasternak, believing her to be dead. The bear put Pasternak’s bloodied body under the leaves and foliage so that it would could return later to eat her.

However, Sergei Ivanov, a hunter, soon arrived on the scene and he ended up shooting the bear dead. He then helped to dig Natalya out of the leaves, and even though she received huge trauma to both her head and limbs that left doctors unsure if she’d survive, she has managed to make a steady recovery.

[Image via outdoorsman/Shutterstock]