Cadet Field Training 2004
Camp Buckner 2 Aug 04
6th Company

The Cadet & The Bear

My son called Wednesday evening when his company returned from OHW. The first thing he said was boy do I have a story for you. My first thought was what has he done now. He proceeded to tell me that he and three of his platoon mates were assigned the task of going ahead of their platoon to set up and recon a forward base. They had found an area that met all their requirements and were waiting for the rest of the platoon to show up.

My son found a trench that he could sit in and not be exposed to the bad guys. He noticed something black that came over the hill and really couldn’t tell what it was. All of a sudden something was coming in the trench with him. It was a black bear. Ever since he was little I have taken him turkey, deer and boar hunting so he is comfortable with creatures in the woods and knows what do according to the situation. He froze and did not move a muscle, the bear got so close, he was smelling his boots. He could have reached out and patted him on the head, at times like this time seems to freeze.

After the bear smelled his boots he looked dead at him, he noticed that at some point in time Wildlife Officers had caught this bear because he had an ear tagged. His estimate of the weight of this bear was around two hundred pounds. The bear decided that he wasn’t interested and backed out of the trench. When he seen that the bear was out he jumped up and yelled “get” to the bear and it started running off with him right behind it hollering “get”. His platoon mates heard him running through the woods hollering, “get” to the bear. If he had moved while the bear was in the trench with him it could have done one of two things. Due to the close quarters it would more than likely have decided to attack with not enough room to really run. Only weapon (besides an M-4 with blanks-useless) was a knife and it wasn’t readily available. An experience he will always remember. Thought I would share this story from CFT 2004 Camp Buckner.

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