You may know why the chicken crossed the road, but why the bear? To get to the other side, of course. A lucky bear gets a brief police escort to cross a rural highway in Utah.
Earlier this week, someone contacted local law enforcement after seeing a black bear in a cemetery near Ephraim, Utah, 115 miles south of Salt Lake City. They were concerned that the bear was heading towards nearby US 89th Street. The Ephraim City Police Department sent police to close the two-lane road and allow the bear to cross safely. The ministry uploaded a video of the interaction on its Facebook page.
The video begins with a black bear emerging from the roadside. It then carefully crossed the sidewalk, looking in both directions until it crossed the double yellow line and sped to the other side. After the scene ended, the bear climbed over a small fence and was chased by an officer with Utah’s Department of Wildlife Resources until it reached relative safety in the mountains.
In a 2018 issue of scientific journals Behavioral Ecosystem, a published study found that American black bears can understand the risks of crossing the street. Bears tracked in Minnesota have high heart rates when crossing the street and shape their movements based on traffic. They cross reasonably congested roads at night while traversing smoother roads during the day.
As an Eagle Scout, this is where I will advise you on the dangers of coming into contact with black bears. For example, a black bear can run at 35 mph, so you should never try to jog one from a distance. Even so, if you’re behind the wheel of a car, you’re in danger. Traffic crashes are one of the leading causes of black bear deaths in the US.
