Avid Trail Runner Returns to Woods Weeks After Bear Mauled Him
Asheville, NC resident Bill Palas has been running on the same trails behind his home for nearly 30 years. Throughout that whole time, he'd never had any run-ins with wild animals. That all changed with a recent horrifying incident.
Palas, whose home abuts Pisgah National Forest, was running as usual the morning of July 7 suddently he saw a bear cub sitting in the middle of the trail. The cub ran off into the brush and Palas realized he might be in danger.
"When you see a cub like that, there’s usually a mom around," he recounted to WLOS. "So, I go and I turn around real quick—and all of a sudden, there I see the momma bear."
The mom began to charge him and he began waving his hands around and yelling to try to scare her off. She ran to the side and Palas thought he was free to go until he realized he was standing between the protective mother and her baby.
"She stands up on her back legs, and here’s this head—her head must have been the size of a basketball—and it’s right here," Palas remembered, likening the feeling to razors across his skin. "She takes her claw and she rakes it across my face and chest."
His arm ended up in the black bear's mouth. He thought he was about to tussle with the massive mammal, but the concerned parent just wanted to get to her kid. While the bear was distracted by her cub, Palas got up and ran away as fast as he could.
"I was running on adrenaline and shock," he admitted. "I got 20 yards or so down the steep hill and I surveyed myself. You know, how bad am I? All I know is blood is just gushing out everywhere."
His wife promptly rushed him to the hospital, where he underwent emergency surgery. "They brought in a special facial plastic surgeon, you know, 'cause they saw I was all tore up on the face," he explained. "He spent three hours sewing on me."
Many stitches later, Palas is just grateful that no permanent damage was done as a result of the attack. "I just feel so lucky that I’m together. I mean, seeing these three-inch razor claws, I could see them this close to my face," he said. "Man, it’s just surreal."
Most people would be deterred from going back to the scene of the crime, but not Palas. The traumatic incident hasn't stopped him from doing what he loves. Since healing from the mauling just a few weeks ago, he's back to running on the trails in Pisgah.
"I definitely have some wilderness street cred now 'cause how many people do you know that’s been attacked by a bear?" he said.
It's an incredible thing to overcome, and perhaps even more amazing to go right back to doing what got him in that situation in the first place.