Alaska Digest 7/25/11

•  ANCHORAGE -- A grizzly bear sow with a cub attacked a group of teenagers on a month-long survival-skills course Saturday night in the Talkeetna Mountains, causing severe injuries to two of the hikers, according to Alaska State Troopers. The bear pounced as the seven hikers were crossing a creek about 8:30 p.m. Saturday, troopers spokeswoman Megan Peters said.

•  JUNEAU -- Rescue crews are searching for the pilot of a small plane that crashed on Douglas Island just west of Juneau. Parts of the wreckage, including the engine and a propeller, were discovered at the base of a 50-foot cliff near the island's Eagle Crest Peak late Sunday afternoon. Search teams had to turn back due to bad weather and rough terrain, but they expected to resume looking Monday with proper equipment to climb the cliff.

•  FAIRBANKS -- Within 15 minutes of starting their search of Harding Lake, two volunteers from Idaho spotted the body of a drowning victim that had eluded searchers for almost two weeks. The secret to their success: an underwater imaging technology these volunteers have brought twice to Harding Lake and four times to Alaska. The technology is called side-scanning sonar. It's not a lifesaving tool, but can help give closure to families of drowning victims classified as "missing." In Alaska, it is not unusual for the bodies of drowning victims to go unrecovered. Out of 162 recreational boating deaths in the last decade, bodies were not recovered in at least 34 cases, according to the State Office of Boating.

I have to say that if the teenagers were left alone without firearms, while traversing bear country, then those adults who left them there should face punishment. That would be, IMHO, criminally negligent.

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