Posted on 06/25/2010 8:29:58 PM PDT by SC Swamp Fox
FLORENCE – A bear that spent much of Friday eluding law enforcement officers from a handful of agencies was finally caught Friday night after leading Florence Police on a final chase through one of Florence’s busiest intersections.
A motorist spotted the juvenile bear walking across Darlington Street at about 7:30 p.m. and called police, Florence Police Maj. Carlos Raines said.
Police contacted the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources, but had to hold the bear at bay until wardens could make it to the scene.
The bear walked through All-Star Lanes bowling alley parking lot on Cashua Drive and into the BB&T Bank parking lot near the busy intersection of Cashua Drive and Evans Street.
“We were kind of herding him a little bit,” Raines said. “We cornered him near King Avenue.”
Police confined the bear to one area and then revved their vehicle engines to keep him there, Raines said.
“The bear never showed any signs of violence. He was just walking,” Raines said. “He’ll go toward a car and if it revved its engine it’ll move away. He just wanted to get out of there.”
DNR officials arrived on the scene and shot the bear with a tranquilizer dart.
The bear climbed a nearby tree, but soon lost consciousness and fell into a ditch filled with straw.
Raines said he isn’t sure how much the bear weighs, but it took four men to carry it from the scene.
“They had their arms full,” he said.
The bear had been on the run since it was first spotted at about 5:15 a.m. on the 1300 block of Tallullah Street in the Harley Place Subdivision.
A short time later, the bear moved to 732 West Sumter Street near Cashua Drive at the Vulcraft Plant, which is where police set up a containment perimeter and called in DNR.
Vulcraft employees reported the bear around 8 a.m. and lined up along a fence at the plant to watch it.
The bear, an object of curiosity and chaos, walked out onto West Sumter Street between two police roadblocks. It wandered along the street while reporters, officers and employees from several businesses captured images with cell phones, cameras and video cameras.
The bear walked back into the woods north of the street and, minutes later, came back out to pretty much the same reception it had earlier. It then walked along the fence line at Superior Machine, through a culvert and on to the plant’s property. That sent officers rushing to the fence and calling for workers to close doors to the plant.
Minutes later, the bear ambled off the plant’s property and into a wooded area between Sumter and Darlington Streets near Cashua Commons.
That’s when authorities lost sight of the bear. Greg Lynch, regional wildlife biologist for SCDNR, said at the time he believed the bear probably scaled a tree behind Cashua Commons for an afternoon nap.
The Food Lion there decided to close the doors and nobody went in or out for a while to protect customers.
“Best case scenario is for this thing to lay down somewhere and leave everybody alone here and we all leave it alone and it walk off and make its way to the river and find someplace for it to be,” Lynch said at the height of the search.
“Basically, what we have here is a young bear that’s been kicked out of his home by his mother,” Lynch added. “When the sows are ready to breed, they kick the young out they’ve had with them for a couple of years, and they’re out wondering around looking for a home for themselves right now.”
While some people and businesses worked to not encounter the bear, many people headed to the area specifically to see the bear. One Florence Police Department veteran noted he didn’t remember anything like this happening before.
Isn't that profiling?
So, are they goiing to run him for Congress?
Paging Sheppard Smith.
I would take that bear over Lindsay Graham any day. Fill the Senate with bears as they are far less destructive.
Glad too. Knowing the locals in that area, they wouldn’t have put up with his shenanigans for long. ;)
Maybe on the Dem ticket. They could do worse... In fact they have.
It's a cage match!
Flo-town Black Bear -vs- Alvin (It's not easy being) Greene
BTTT
A bear that spent much of Friday eluding law enforcement officers from a handful of agencies was finally caught Friday night after leading Florence Police on a final chase through one of Florence’s busiest intersections.Then the bear immediately confessed to having a fling with Nikki Haley.
LOL! Yup. The bear in a fillibuster might tear slimy Chris Dodd a new a****le.
Would things have been handled differently if this was a polar bear?
Depends on the polar bear’s mood.
They have been known to regularly return to play with chained sled dogs.
Probably. A white bear wouldn't be safe walkin' through most north Florence neighborhoods.
especially a BLACK bear. I wonder if the cops would have harassed a White bear in the same neighborhood...
;OP
;-)
A large boar polar bear came over a rise 200 yds. off, saw them and started their way.
The Inuit slipped off his pack, sat down and started to unlace his boots.
As the bear started to gallop towards them, not 100 yds away, the Inuit pulled a pair of running shoes from his pack and slipped them on.
The terrified hippy screamed "What are you doing? You can't out run him!"
To which the Inuit replied "I don't have to out run him, I just have to out run you."
Now we know what happened to Dippy, the Hippy.
He joined Timmy (Bear Scat) Treadwell in the Great Scat Pat In The Sky.
Yep. Treadwell proved that some humans aren’t smarter than bears.
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