A BRITISH teenager savaged to death by a polar bear in Norway has been
described by his family as “strong, fearless and kind.”
Eton schoolboy Horatio Chapple, 17, of Salisbury, Wilts, died after the beast
clawed its way into his tent as he slept.
His grieving loved ones paid tribute to the youngster saying he was “so
excited about his plans to be a doctor, strong, fearless and kind with an
amazing sense of humour and an ability to laugh at himself.”
Four other young people on a British Schools Exploring Society expedition were
injured in the attack on Spitsbergen island. The bear was shot dead by a
trip leader.
It emerged last night schoolboy Patrick Flinders saved himself by punching the
40-stone creature on the NOSE.
Brave Patrick lashed out after the bear pounced on a tent where three
teenagers were sleeping in the glacial region of northern Norway yesterday.
But he was unable to prevent it mauling to death tragic Horatio.
Terry Flinders, the dad of Patrick, 16, said last night: “According to the
doctor, Patrick was trying to fend off the polar bear by hitting it on the
nose.
“The bear attacked him with its right paw across his face and his head and his
arm.”
“It grabbed hold of the other boy and just killed him. Perhaps he was the
closest one.”
Thirteen young people were in four tents at Von Postbreen, Spitsbergen — an
island 600 miles from the North Pole in the Svalbard archipelago — when the
bear attacked.
They were taking part in a British Schools Exploring Society adventure
holiday, who today annouced it was ending the expedition.
Eton schoolboy Horatio was the son of David Chapple, a consultant orthopaedic
and spinal surgeon of Salisbury, Wilts.
The injured survivors, who all have head wounds, were named as trip leaders
Michael “Spike” Reid, 29, and Andrew Ruck, 27, and students Patrick and
Scott Smith, 17. The huge male bear struck at the unsuspecting camp at
7.25am. Youngsters aged 16 to their early twenties scattered as the beast
rampaged after a warning tripwire system failed.
One of the two older group leaders managed to shoot the bear dead — but not
before being badly injured.
Mr Flinders, of Jersey, went on: “The bear got into the tent where Patrick
was. If he’d looked at Patrick, he was the chubbiest one — he probably had
more meat on him, bless him.
“’Patrick was probably in the middle, because it grabbed hold of his head
next, and then his arm. I don’t know how Patrick got out to be honest —
unless it was when the guy came in and shot the bear with a rifle. But the
young lad was already dead.
“The leader who killed the bear was mauled and he’s really, really bad.”
Police were alerted using a satellite phone and arrived by helicopter to a
scene of carnage.
Two air ambulance medical teams including neurosurgeons were scrambled from
Tromso on the mainland. Survivors were taken to the town of Longyearbyen, 25
miles away, and then on to University Hospital in Tromso. BSES chairman
Edward Watson said: “With great sadness the BSES confirms the tragic death
of one of the members of its expedition in Svalbard.
“We extend our utmost sympathy to the family.
“In addition to this death, four other members of the expedition have
sustained injuries, two of them severe. No other members of the expedition
have been injured.”
He added: “Horatio was a fine young man hoping to go on to study medicine
after school. By all accounts he would have made an excellent doctor.”
Remote Von Postbreen can only be reached by snowmobile or by air in winter,
although boats sail from Longyearbyen in summer.
Eric Nygaard, a local official, said the British party had been staying near
Hampus Mountains.
He said: “The bear attacked while they were all inside. It ignored traps
placed around the canvases to scare it off.
“The bear was shot by one of the survivors and it slumped dead between two of
the tents.”
Polar explorer Tom Avery said: “Maybe the bear caught them unawares and they
did not have a chance to see it coming and frighten it away. You are
constantly aware of the threat, or scouting the terrain. Svalbard is very
remote. It has the largest concentration of bears in the world.”
The field trip team had been on a five-week expedition, studying glaciology,
geology, hydrology, meteorology & snow science.
Survivor Spike Reid has been leading expeditions for seven years.
He joined expeditions to the Nepali Himalayas and the Russian Altai before
spending seven months circumnavigating the globe in 2008.
BSES, a charity based in West London, provides a number of extreme tours for
young people and sends many on the Duke of Edinburgh Award Scheme. The trips
are aimed at “the development of young people through the challenge of
living and working in remote and testing areas”.
Kyle Gouveia, 17, who was on the expedition but came home early with
frostbite, said the group was given shooting practice on the second day of
the trip in case a polar bear attacked.
They also had “bear watches” at their base camp in Svalbard and practised
using “bear flares”.
Although police said bear attacks were rare, there have been four reported
deaths from attacks in the region since 1995. The 3,000 population of
Longyearbyen routinely carry rifles for protection.
Sandra Swresser, a restaurant manager, said: “It’s very sad. We have had
attacks before. I can only suppose the bear attacked them because it was
looking for food.”
Another local, Liv Rose Flygel, 55, said: “Last summer a man was attacked by a
polar bear but survived. He was taken in the mouth of the bear and his
friend shot it.
“The problem is, when the ice goes, the bears cannot catch food.
“People don’t really know how dangerous they are.”
Attack highlights polar bear dangers
THE attack by a polar bear which left one member of a British group dead in
Svalbard highlights how dangerous the world’s largest land carnivore can be.
There are 20,000 to 25,000 polar bears in 19 populations across the Arctic,
with the animal found in Canada, Greenland, the US state of Alaska, Norway
and Russia.
The males typically weigh up to 1,200lb (550kg), and are up to 12ft long, with
females around half their size. The animals, whose huge paws act like snow
shoes on the ice, roam over wide areas and can swim long distances.
They have an acute sense of smell which can enable them to pick up the scent
of a seal – their main prey – miles away.
But despite their position as top predator in the food chain, polar bears are
listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as
“vulnerable” to extinction.
The main threat they face is loss of their icy environment as a result of
climate change, though they are also at risk from pollutants in the Arctic
ecosystem and the potential exploitation of the region for oil.
In the US they have been declared an endangered species because of the impact
of global warming on their habitat.
The bears rely on the marine sea ice environment for their survival, using the
ice for hunting and breeding.
The Barents Sea region has a population of several thousand bears, around half
of which use Svalbard islands far inside the Arctic circle, for their dens
to raise cubs.
The animals are concentrated in the icier east and the north of the
archipelago.
The Norwegian Polar Institute says that some bears based in Svalbard will
follow the sea ice as it retreats north during the summer melting period to
continue hunting, while others will remain on land waiting several months
for the ice to return.
While the seals are their main source of prey, they are opportunistic hunters
who will scavenge from whale carcasses, feed on nesting seabirds and their
eggs, and even kill reindeer.
Svalbard is one of several places in the Arctic where tourists are given the
opportunity to take trips to see polar bears.