A bear stranded on utility pole in Union County, New Mexico, died after it was electrocuted when it tried to climb down from a charged high-voltage line. The animal had been hanging there in distress on Monday, July 20, while drivers stopped to watch, film and take pictures.
Robin Dawson, who said he was driving along Highway 56 when he spotted the bear, said he was the first to call 911. He said he could hear the animal panting from across the road and saw its hind paws dangling in the air as it clung to the pole amid power lines. Dawson said the pole was charged and that the bear looked alive but trapped, leaving little doubt that the outcome would be bad if it tried to descend.
What made the incident newsworthy on July 23 was not only the death itself, but the way the response unfolded. Dawson said he was told the case would be referred to New Mexico Fish and Wildlife, then waited more than 30 minutes for authorities to arrive. He said he later heard that Fish and Game would not intervene and that the bear would come down on its own, a response he believed was too slow for a situation involving live power lines.
The New Mexico Department of Wildlife gave a different account. It said it was notified at about 10 a.m. local time on Monday that a bear had climbed a power pole east of Gladstone and instructed the reporting party to leave it alone so it could come down naturally. The agency said local dispatch was also asked to tell concerned callers to keep away, but some people kept stopping beside the pole to film and take photos while the bear remained at the top. It said the Union County Sheriff’s Office, the power company and wildlife conservation officers were notified, but the bear sustained fatal injuries before responders arrived.
That account leaves one question unresolved: what first startled the bear onto the pole. The department said it was likely reacting to a threat and climbed the pole the way it might climb a tree in the wild. It also said the closest conservation officer was about 80 miles away and that the area was remote, with the nearest town 40 miles or more away. For now, the known facts point to a brief, lethal chain of events in which curiosity from passing motorists and a delayed response did nothing to change the end.
Dawson said he was later told the bear had been electrocuted when it tried to get down, and he blamed the people taking pictures for slowing the response. The department said the public should leave wildlife alone when it is encountered. In this case, that warning came after the bear had already stayed on the pole for about an hour and a half, and after the moment that might have been saved had already passed.
