Published July 9, 2026 02:41PM
A black bear attacked a campsite in Wyoming’s Bighorn National Forest in early July, ignoring attempts by two campers and their four dogs trying to scare the animal away. Now, experts say the bear’s unusual behavior signals its comfort with humans and could become a dangerous problem in the future.
On July 5, two women, Shonna Dehl and Maggie Basset, were camping near Fool Creek, a scenic drainage in the northern part of the forest. Although the duo had no food or scented items in their tent, the bear tore into their tent in the middle of the night, Dehl recounted on Facebook.
Chris Servheen, the former national grizzly bear recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), told Outside that in his opinion, the bear should be euthanized.
“This bear is way too aggressive around humans, and should be removed immediately,” he said. “This bear’s dangerous, and he’s not going to change. This incident is only going to reinforce this kind of behavior, so the next people he encounters, he’s probably going to do the same thing.”
The dogs barked, and the women eventually fired gunshots near the bear to scare it away. Their attempts didn’t work, however, and the two hid in their parked cars nearby, honking their horns to keep the bear away, according to an interview with the Montana outlet KTVQ.
“We took all the precautions to pack up all food and drinks and nothing in our tents, but the bear went straight for us and our tents. It would not be deterred, and we had to abandon camp in the middle of the night, but the bear still came back and completely destroyed our tents,” Dehl wrote in her Facebook post.
When the bear wouldn’t leave, they reportedly drove away. Upon their return in the morning, they said the bear destroyed their campsite.
What Should I Do If A Bear Attacks My Campsite?
The Bighorn Mountains are active black bear habitat, according to the National Park Service. A camper can practice the best bear-aware strategies, but a problem bear can quickly become a people problem. Servheen said that by leaving the camp—once they couldn’t scare the bear away—Dehl and Bassett did the right thing. However, he added that if a bear tears into your tent, the first course of action is to spray it with bear spray.
“Don’t run away,” he told Outside. “Running away can cause the bear to chase you. Spraying it is the first thing to do.”
Dehl commented on her Facebook post that she and Bassett both carried bear spray, but the bear attacked too quickly for them to use it.
“We were asleep, and we were woken up from the tent ripping,” she wrote. “My tent was about 50 feet from Maggie’s, and she yelled, dogs barked, the bear didn’t care, only ripped more. It happened so fast.”
Warning gunshots, she said, were the only thing that scared the bear away long enough for them to reach their vehicles.
Servheen said that in his 35-year career managing grizzlies for the FWS, he recalled a handful of similar instances, where a bear invaded a tent even when there was no food inside and wasn’t deterred by barking dogs.
“This is extremely rare,” he said. “Dogs can be a deterrent, but if a bear has had experience with dogs, and it was able to do what it wanted to do and ignore the dogs, it will ignore dogs in the future. They learn that dogs are not a big deal.”
Your Bear Safety Measures Protect Future Campers
People’s historical behavior at a campsite can teach even a good bear bad habits. Food, garbage, and other scented products—such as toiletries and gasoline—can initially attract a bear, and train them to associate certain sites with people and food. Bear safety protects other campers and hikers who visit a wilderness area later.
“It all boils down to the fact that the bear seems to have received a food reward in association with camps and tents in the past,” Servheen said. “These people seemed to be doing all the right things.”
“But that’s the point. You can do everything right, and a bear can still behave really crazily. It’s not your fault. It’s someone else’s fault who trained that bear, and you’re suffering the consequences. That’s why it’s so important to make sure that you do the right thing, keep a clean camp, and don’t teach a bear to behave like this,” he added.
