North Carolina Man Details How Lucky He Is to Be Alive After Bear Claws His Face

A 71-year-old man was attacked and confronted by a bear in Asheville, North Carolina, who clawed his face while protecting her cub as he was on a job.

Bill Palas would have been left severely disfigured if not for some very successful plastic surgery.

The attack happened on July 7 on a mountain trail in Asheville. It was a path he had taken many times before, but on that day, as he rounded a corner, he came upon a little black bear cub. He immediately knew he was in big trouble.

“There was a 20-pound cub there in the trail that’s when mama got spooked out and tried to protect the cub and she came right after me,” he told Inside Edition. “We were kind of staring each other down for prob three seconds. They tell us the idea is to wave your arms and holler to try to divert them.”

As Palas did that, he recalled the bear “stood up on her hind legs and she weighs 300 and her head is right in front of mine and she takes her claw and rakes it across my face and chest.”

Palas actually tried to punch the bear, saying, “I got to hit her in the head and my forearm went into her mouth.”

Then thankfully, the mamma bear ran away and Palas lived to tell the tale.

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