Polar bears besiege Russian scientitsts.

[Torplexed]

(MOSCOW) -- A pair of scientists on a remote Russian island are besieged in their research station by a group of aggressive, hungry polar bears.

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF), says that a meteorologist and an engineer are stuck inside the Fyodorov weather station on Vaygach island in the Arctic Ocean, an incredibly remote place.

The researchers have told the charity that the bears have started sleeping near their hut, behaving aggressively and fighting one another over food, which is a bad sign. They tried to scare off the bears with flares but it apparently had no effect.

The researchers normally go outside twice a-day to take readings from the sea but the likelihood of being attacked by a bear means they have not been able to.

The men said they don't have anything else to try and drive the bears away.

WWF says it is going to ask the Russian government to send help.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34123834


I can see the movie possibilities already. The Siege of Ice Station Zoo.

[Onkel Neal]

They don't have rifles? That would settle the issue.
https://d22r54gnmuhwmk.cloudfront.net/photos/7/sl/kv/szSlkvawWzWBCnk-800x450-noPad.jpg

Or, maybe they can get a drone to wave a piece of seal in front of them and lead them off a few miles...

.

[Oberon]

I dunno, these bears have been around Russian scientists, the effect of the vodka will probably dull the pain of any rifle round.

Clearly the Russians need to bring in the bear cavalry, it's the only answer. :yep:

[Aktungbby]

I trust ( but verify) nothing will happen to the bears-they were there first and it is the ursine gulag after all! The scientists need to evac.

[Oberon]

Are you saying that the polar bears are the last political refugees of the civil war between the Bolshevik Black bears and the Menshevik Polar Bears?

[Aktungbby]

http://www.polarbearsinternational.org/about-polar-bears/essentials/conflicts-and-encounters (http://www.polarbearsinternational.org/about-polar-bears/essentials/conflicts-and-encounters) http://www.polarbearsinternational.org/sites/default/files/styles/inside_full/public/d00039978.jpg?itok=W4HfiPlmThe trick is to coexist: and the bears, ever the apex predator, and in severe straits with global warming loss of ice habitat, have dominion. No shooting allowed; the research can wait.

[Oberon]

I'm with that, they are quite magnificent beasts, no doubt about it. Pity that the decline in their habitat is going to force them to encroach further into human occupied regions, thus bringing them into conflict with us.

[Aktungbby]

Worse yet! the habitat deprivation has compelled some perfectly white polar bears to fulfill their...Mandingo fantasies...in the 'heat of the moment'...so to speak!!:doh::O: "a bear that was part-grizzly, part-polar bear, roaming the land where tundra meets sea ice? People called it the grolar bear, I was told, or sometimes the pizzly bear.http://a5.files.psmag.com/image/upload/c_fit,cs_srgb,dpr_1.0,q_80,w_460/MTI4Njk2MDQzOTU2MTE1OTM0.jpg
Pizzly bear? I thought at the time. Come on.
But the hybrid is very real. (Although, clearly, “grolar bear” is the superior choice of name.) And if some scientists’ predictions are correct, it could be just one of a whole host of potential hybrid mammal species to emerge from the Arctic as it continues to warm." If the bear species can get along...why can't we! http://www.psmag.com/nature-and-technology/the-grolar-bear-is-just-the-first-of-many-inter-species-hybrids-coming-to-the-arctic (http://www.psmag.com/nature-and-technology/the-grolar-bear-is-just-the-first-of-many-inter-species-hybrids-coming-to-the-arctic) FYI 4 ignorant subsimmers: Very small chunks of floating ice (http://www.athropolis.com/arctic-facts/fact-iceberg-float.htm) that rise only about 1 meter / 3 feet out of the water are called "growlers". When trapped air escapes as the iceberg melts (http://www.athropolis.com/arctic-facts/fact-berg-unstable.htm), it sometimes makes a sound like the growl of an animal, and that's how growlers got their name.

[Oberon]

"If bear species can get along, why can't we?"


Question of the millennia right there. :yep:

[Commander Wallace]

Why not simply tranquilize the bears and relocate them ? It's not their fault their habitat is being taken away.

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trapped-polar-bear-saved-fishing-net-alaskan-island-n422771

Trapped Polar Bear Saved From Fishing Net on Alaskan Island

by Shamar Walters


U.S. scientists and local residents joined forces to free a 1,000-pound polar bear trapped in fishing net on a remote Arctic island on Saturday, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) said.
The adult male was tangled up in the net on a barrier island off the coast of Alaska when the USGS and biologists from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service came to the rescue.
The USGS said the operation began with biologists tranquilizing the polar bear by "darting it" from a helicopter. That's when locals from the nearby community of Kaktovik provided critical support.
"Local residents, using boats, kept the bear from drowning while the tranquilizers took effect," the USGS said on Facebook.
"Once the bear was sedated, the biologists worked to quickly untangle the bear from the net and, after determining it appeared uninjured from its ordeal, released it back into the wild.



"A great effort by all to keep this magnificent animal in the wild."

[Oberon]

Elsewhere, sadder news prevails:
https://instagram.com/p/7TRP7WlsKm/

[ikalugin]

Well atleast polar bears are not as hunted as their brown kind is.

[Jimbuna]

Elsewhere, sadder news prevails:
https://instagram.com/p/7TRP7WlsKm/

Awful :nope: