This isn't the same video of the brown bear chasing a skier that we posted in January, but it's at the same spot in Romania – the Predeal Ski Resort –and this time the chase is a lot more intense. As this second brown bear approaches a group of ski students, the instructor, Adrian Stoica, heroically breaks away from the group (2:55) to lure the bear away.
And the chase is on. For minutes on end, the brown bear is on the skier's heels, baring its teeth at times. It was an adrenaline rush even for me as the viewer. At one point the instructor comes across another group of skiers and warns them that a bear is following him. Amazingly, Stoica seems to stay calm throughout the chase, explaining later he had to "stay calm," because "bears feel the fear."
From USA Today:
"I slowly waved my arms, slowly moved out of the group and made the bear come after me as he was really close to the group," he told ABC. "I was just hoping that the bear would get tired and would go back to the forest." …
"It was a horror, but also an experience of a lifetime — alone with a wild animal in the wilderness," Stoica told ABC.
Stoica acted nonchalantly throughout the episode, despite the bear coming so close and it being such a dangerous encounter, but he explained to ABC that it was important to "stay calm," saying "bears feel the fear."
In the end, the bear suddenly gives up and makes its way back into the woods.
