Annie Walton Doyle
The harrowing final words of a documentary maker and his girlfriend, who were eaten alive by bears, were caught on camera.
On October 5, 2003, the lives of Timothy Treadwell and his girlfriend Amie Huguenard were tragically ended by a grizzly bear attack.
Chillingly, the event was captured on tape.
The couple’s last minutes on Earth, including their terrified screams, were all caught on camera.
Warning: The following article contains distressing content.
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Although humans are often thought of as the dominant species on Earth, some individuals have a desire to reconnect with the natural world and live a wilder sort of life.
However, nature can be cruel, as many famous faces have learned over the years.
Roy Horn, whose life changed forever when a tiger named Montecore who was involved in his live shows attacked him on stage, almost killing him; Bruno Zehnder, who was killed while living among penguins in Antarctica; and Steve Irwin, who died during a documentary shoot featuring stingrays, all serve to remind us of the brutality of the natural world.
Yet, Timothy Treadwell’s story stands out as one of the most horrifying of these cautionary tales.
Known as the ‘Grizzly Man’, Treadwell’s passion for bears led him into a career of environmentalism and documentary filmmaking, particularly focusing on the grizzly bears of Alaska’s Katmai National Park.
He was so comfortable around the deadly creatures that he gave them names and considered them friends.
Having battled addiction and alcoholism in the past, he openly expressed his aversion to modern society, finding solace and contentment in the wilderness among bears rather than amidst the hustle and bustle of towns and cities.
As a committed filmmaker, he diligently documented his interactions with bears.
Starting in the late 1980s, he spent 13 consecutive summers in Alaska, camping along the Katmai Coast, renowned for its abundant grizzly population.
Treadwell divided his time between ‘Big Green’, a grassy area on Hallo Bay, ideal for bear sightings, and Kaflia Bay, a dense, wooded area known as the ‘Grizzly Maze’, offering closer bear encounters.
His interactions with the bears, documented on film, often involved risky proximity, including touching and playing with bear cubs, despite persistent warnings from park authorities.
Treadwell persisted in his pursuit to get up close and personal with the bears.
But this ultimately led to him meeting his demise in October 2003.
Camping in the Grizzly Maze beyond the usual season, Treadwell and his girlfriend, Amie Huguenard encountered a bear during its aggressive feeding period.
When a bear is feeding, it’s a particularly perilous situation for any humans nearby.
This danger was compounded by Treadwell’s lack of defensive measures against the predator.
Treadwell and Huguenard’s tragic end was discovered by an air taxi pilot.
When Willy Fulton, an air taxi pilot, arrived at the campsite in the Alaskan wilderness for a scheduled pick-up after their bear study expedition, he was met with a bone-chilling scene.
Silence enveloped the area as he witnessed a grisly sight: a massive bear, described as ‘the meanest looking bear’, feasting on human remains.
Alarmed by the absence of the couple, Fulton promptly contacted Katmai National Park rangers.
It didn’t take long for Joe Ellis and his team to comprehend the tragedy that had unfolded.
The couple’s tents were collapsed and torn, indicating a violent encounter.
Despite an untouched evening meal and shoes left outside, the most disturbing revelation came with the discovery of a mound of grass nearby, concealing human body parts, including fingers and an arm.
The ghastly scene continued as investigators found Tim’s severed and mutilated head, along with his detached right arm still adorned with a wristwatch.
The pieces fell into place, painting a gruesome picture of the couple’s fate.
The discovery of a six-minute audio recording, capturing the horrifying sounds of the attack, added another layer of tragedy to the already harrowing tale.
Despite Treadwell’s comfort around the creatures and his habit of naming them as friends, his final moments captured a terrifying reality.
Treadwell hadn’t removed the lens cap, but the microphone was still running and the distressing six-minute attack was caught on audio.
The audio recording from the incident, lasting six agonising minutes, revealed the harrowing cries of the couple as they faced the bear’s onslaught.
Huduenard’s desperate attempts to intervene, followed by Treadwell’s anguished screams, portrayed a scene of unimaginable horror.
Subsequent investigation revealed that the bear responsible for the attack had consumed a significant portion of human remains.
Park rangers noted Treadwell’s luck in surviving as long as he did over his summers spent at the park, attributing the confusion of the bears to his direct, unconventional interactions.
The tragic incident became the subject of Werner Herzog’s award-winning documentary, The Grizzly Man, which delved into Treadwell’s life and fatal encounter with the bears he had grown so close to.
The biography was critically acclaimed, achieving a 92 per cent Certified Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
In footage from the documentary, Treadwell confirms that there is one bear he never felt comfortable around.
Huguenard also believed Treadwell was playing with fire and called him ‘hellbent on destruction’ in the film.
Treadwell believed the bears were his friends – but the bears clearly did not reflect his sentiment.
The recording of the couple’s final moments remains under lock and key in the possession of one of Treadwell’s closest friends.
As part of his documentary, filmmaker Werner Herzog could be seen with his hands over his face as he listened to the tape recording.
Herzog’s advice is that people should ‘never listen to this’.
“And you must never look at the photos I’ve seen at the coroner’s office,” he added.
“I think you should not keep it, you should destroy it.”
The final words spoken by Treadwell, however, were captured in the footage.
At the beginning Huguenard is heard asking if the bear is still out there before Treadwell screams: “Get out here! I’m getting killed out here!”
Treadwell encourages Huguenard to ‘hit the bear’ while she urges him to ‘fight back’.
Huguenard hits the bear with a frying pan, before her agonising screams are heard before the tape cuts out.
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