35-year-old Massachusetts veteran recalls horrific grizzly bear attack

• Shayne Patrick Burke, 35, was attacked in Grand Teton National Park on Sunday
• The female animal protected her young, he said in a post on Instagram
• He attributed his rescue to a can of bear spray that he administered when the bear bit him

A disabled Army veteran has detailed how he miraculously survived an encounter with a grizzly bear in the Wyoming wilderness in which he was mauled.

Shayne Patrick Burke, 35, suffered serious injuries and announced in an Instagram post that he was “in the wrong place at the wrong time” when a grizzly bear attacked him on Sunday.

The adult animal was protecting its young, he said, which led to a brutal attack. The war veteran described it as the “most brutal” thing he had ever experienced.

He saved his life by using a can of bear spray to spray himself when the animal was gnawing on his hands, legs and neck and almost killed him instantly.

But the former reservist never gave up – she held onto the can as she went in for the kill. How did he make it out alive? “She bit my hands on the back of my neck and at the same time bit the bear spray can, which exploded in her mouth,” he said.

Scroll down for the video:

The attack, he added, occurred on Signal Mountain, an isolated peak about 7,700 feet above sea level in Grand Teton National Park.

While he was there for an hour looking for a great grey owl to photograph, he had the “surprising encounter” with the brown bear, he wrote online as his recovery continues.

“I was walking through a dense forest area in a valley,” he wrote, revealing that he had recently separated from his wife and had arranged to meet again in a nearby parking lot.

“I came over a rise in the hillside to my right and noticed a brown bear cub running up a hill about 50-70 meters in front of me. I knew this was not good.

“I pulled out my bear spray and saw the mother bear attack,” he continued.

“I stood my ground, screamed and tried to use the bear spray, but by the time I did, the gap had already closed.

“When she hit me, I turned around, turned my back to her, lay on my stomach and got ready for the ride.”

He wrote that at this point he “clasped his hands behind my neck to protect my vital organs” and that “I felt the first bite and cut on his back/right shoulder.”

“I screamed,” Burke, a Massachusetts native, wrote in a follow-up that appears in the post’s comments.

“Then she turned around and kicked me on the back. She bit my leg, picked me up and threw me to the ground several times. She bit each leg, from my buttocks to the inside of my knee, about three times each.

“The last time,” he added, “I screamed again.”

However, this brought the bear The attention was focused on his head, he wrote, which led to the near-fatal attack on his neck.

“I still had my hands folded and my arms protecting my carotid arteries,” he recalls.I never let go of the bear spray can again.’

When the beast bit his hands trying to get past them, she hit the can.

“That saved my life during the first attack. I heard them running away, looked up and immediately ran in the opposite direction up a hill.

“After putting some distance between myself and the bear, I tried to call my wife,” he added. The post shared photos that presumably show him covered in blood seconds after the attack.

“It didn’t go through, so I sent a text message saying ‘attacked,'” he continued.

“She called me back and I told her what had happened when I applied improvised tourniquets to my legs.”

He called 911 and stayed on the line, hoping a helicopter would locate him.

“At this point I knew I didn’t have an arterial bleed and just needed to slow the bleeding in my legs,” he wrote, adding a photo of himself lying flat on his back, desperately clutching a hunting knife.

“I lay alone in the woods, clutching my knife and leaning with my back against a tree, hoping the bear wouldn’t come back,” he wrote, while he still had fresh wounds all over his body.

“By calling 911, the helicopter was able to triangulate my location since the patchy service could not give us an exact location.

“At this point, my legs weren’t working properly anymore,” he added – and revealed that he just hoped the bear wouldn’t return.

Because he continued to bleed, it took hours for the helicopter to determine his location.

“At that moment on that little hill, I accepted that I could very well die. I recorded a short video telling my people that I love them,” he admitted.

But as luck would have it, the helicopter finally arrived and took him to St. John Hospital in Jackson, a few kilometers away.

There he underwent emergency surgery, with numerous cuts visible in the haunting photos published along with the report.

After investigating the incident, the National Park Service (NPS) stated that it would not attempt to capture or kill the grizzly bear because the animals typically only become aggressive when they feel threatened, especially when their young are at risk.

In another excerpt from his report, Burge said that no one supported this decision more than he did and expressed his understanding for the animal that almost took his life.

“I thought long and hard about how I would share my story about my encounter with a grizzly bear and her cub,” he posted, showing the scars as proof.

“I want to start by saying how much I love and respect wildlife. What happened on Signal Mountain was a case of ‘wrong place, wrong time.'”

Mother bears aggressively defend their offspring and stay with them for two to three years after birth.

The decision not to pursue the bears, which officials determined were behaving naturally after the surprise attack, was consistent with attacks that do not involve raids on campsites, eating human food scraps or similar behaviors that make bears more dangerous.

Citing about 1,000 bears in the area, park rangers said they did not know who was responsible for the attack on Sunday afternoon.

As mentioned, the attack occurred despite the victim carrying bear repellent spray and making noise to warn the bears in the forest – which highlights the dangers of such an encounter.

The investigation into the incident was ongoing at the time of writing. Burke’s recovery is also ongoing. He did not provide information on the extent of his injuries or whether he has yet left the hospital.

DailyMail.com has reached out to Burke for comment. In an update broadcast this week, officials said his condition was “stable” and he was “expected to make a full recovery.”