Woman injured after being attacked by polar bear in Norway's Svalbard

COPENHAGEN, DENMARK -- A French tourist was injured Monday after a polar bear attacked a campsite in Norway's arctic Svalbard archipelago, officials said. The wounds were not life-threatening, he added.

The unidentified woman was part of her group of 25 on tour while camping in Sveasletta, in central Svalbard. did. Mainland Norway. The campsite was across the fjord from Longyearbyen, the main settlement in the Arctic Svalbard.

Authorities responded to news of the attack that came in shortly before 8:30 a.m. Chief Superintendent Stein Olav Bredli flew there by helicopter.

"A French woman suffered an injury to her arm. The polar bear was frightened and left the area," he said. Details of her injuries have not been disclosed. She was taken by helicopter to a hospital in Longyearbyen.

Her Svalbardposten, the leading newspaper in the Arctic Islands, said the victim was a woman in her 40s, and that the woman suffered minor injuries, citing local hospital official Solveig Jacobsen. Stated.

Bredri said the polar bear was injured and that "staff on the ground are considering how to deal with it."

Svalbard is dotted with polar bear warnings. Visitors who choose to sleep outdoors receive a strict warning from authorities that they must carry firearms. At least five of her deaths have been caused by polar bears since the 1970s. The last time it happened was in 2020, when a 38-year-old Dutch man was killed.

An estimated 20,000 to 25,000 polar bears live in the Arctic.

In 2015, a polar bear dragged a Czech tourist camping north of Longyearbyen out of his tent and scratched his back before being chased off with gunshots. The bear was then found and killed by authorities.