A state of emergency has been declared in a northern Slovakian town after five people were injured in a second bear attack in three days.
A 49-year-old woman was treated in hospital for an injury to her shoulder, and a 72-year-old man for a cut to his head, local authorities said. A 10-year-old girl and two further adults suffered scratches and bruises, authorities said.
People were asked not to leave residential areas. Authorities on Monday said the bear was still at large and six armed patrols were hunting it. Video footage circulating on social media showed terrified residents running for their lives as the bear rampaged through the streets.
Town Hall Said Security Forces Have Been Given Order to 'Eliminate' the Bear
"The bear has been pushed into uninhabited zones by rescue and security forces where emergency teams ... have orders to eliminate it," the town hall said, calling on residents to exercise maximum caution especially in the early morning and evening.
"Hunters will patrol in the at-risk area, police patrols have been strengthened and brown bear emergency teams from all over the country have been ordered to our city and surroundings. A thermal imagine drone is also being deployed.
"We are a town between mountains, but still a town. We cannot allow a bear to attack five people in the centre in broad daylight."
Woman Killed While Walking with Male Companion After Being Chased by Bear
The incident came days after a 31-year-old Belarussian woman, identified by local media as Tatiana, died while trying to evade a brown bear in the Low Tatra mountain range near the same town.
The woman had been walking in a thickly forested area on the western side of the Demänovská valley in the Low Tatras with a 29-year-old male companion, the Slovakian mountain rescue service said, when the bear charged and fatally mauled her.
The pair split and ran in opposite directions. Rescue teams with dogs and drones mounted a search after being alerted by the man, who was located "scared but unhurt" at the top of a steep ravine. The woman's body was found at the bottom.
Slovakia has witnessed several bear attacks in recent years, including its first fatal assault in more than a century, in 2021. A 57-year-old man was found in the central Banskô valley with his hip, neck and hand mauled and recent bear prints nearby.
