Mongolia bear attack prompts school outing warning

Mongolia has advised schools and kindergartens to avoid outings to forested and mountainous areas after a bear killed a man and seriously injured a woman on the outskirts of Ulaanbaatar.

The Ministry of Education said group autumn trips should not be organised near areas where bears have been sighted. It also said children should not go alone into forested or mountainous areas, and that excursions should be avoided in high-risk locations.

Authorities said 754 bear sightings have been recorded across Mongolia so far this year, with 80 percent involving cubs or female bears with cubs. In Ulaanbaatar, 24 confirmed sightings have been reported, compared with two in 2018 and one in 2019.

Munkhbayar M., the head of the city environment department, said a man in his 40s and a woman in her 50s were attacked on Wednesday night in their home in the Bayanzurkh district. An official from the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change said a team using rangers, police and thermal imaging drones later found and killed the bear near the site of the attack.

Ministry secretary Batbayar Shurenchuluun said preliminary findings indicated the bear was a male about six years old. Officials said the government has authorised bear hunting in designated areas and begun an investigation into the increase in sightings.

Authorities said in September they banned the harvesting of nuts and berries from mountainous areas for this year after a hunted bear examined in Khentii province was found to have no food in its stomach.