Man Killed by Grizzly in Yellowstone Visiting 'Place He Loved,' Family Says

BILLINGS, Mont. — Wildlife agents were trying to capture a grizzly bear in Yellowstone National Park on Monday after it killed a Michigan hiker in the second fatal bear attack this summer at the famed park.


The body of John Wallace, 59, was discovered Friday in a backcountry area known for its high population of bears.


He was traveling alone and had pitched his tent in a campground along the Mary Mountain Trail on Wednesday.


His body was discovered by two hikers. An autopsy conducted Sunday confirmed that Wallace died of traumatic injuries from a bear attack.


"There was no witness to this incident, and we really don't have a lot of information to help us determine why this attack may have occurred," said Al Nash, park spokesman.


He said park rangers are conducting flyovers of the area where the attack occurred.


"The next step is to see if we can find a bear, and then determine if that is the bear involved in the incident," Nash said. "That might help them figure out why this attack happened at all."


Wallace is the second person to die of a bear attack in the park this summer. In July, a female bear attacked and killed a 57-year-old Torrance, Calif., man. Authorities let the responsible grizzly go because it was protecting its cubs.


The bear that killed Wallace is believed to be a different animal than the one in the July killing.


The earlier mauling occurred about eight miles away from where Wallace's body was found.


This time, rangers have set traps with the intent to capture and kill the bruin that attacked Wallace. Its guilt would be established through DNA analysis connecting it to evidence found at the mauling scene, park officials said.


Bear attacks are rare at Yellowstone. No one was hurt by a bear in the park last year, and before the two latest incidents, no human had been killed by a bear in the park since 1986.


There are more than 600 bears in the greater Yellowstone area, and Chris Servheen, grizzly-bear recovery coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, said the Hayden Valley where Wallace was killed is known to have "a lot of bears."


Once a rare sight even in the wilds of Yellowstone, grizzly bears have become an almost routine cause for curious tourists lining up at Yellowstone's roadsides for a glimpse. The bears, whose population was near extinction last century, are protected from hunting even outside the park under the Endangered Species Act.


Despite the killings, park officials said the rate of dangerous encounters is extremely low given that more than 3 million people visit the park every year.


"We've averaged one encounter that has caused injuries a year for the past 25 years," said park superintendent Dan Wenk. "The record speaks for itself."


A resident of Chassell, Mich., Wallace worked for about 20 years at the Portage Lake District Library in Houghton, a city in Michigan's western Upper Peninsula. He was married and had no children, said Shawn Leche, the library director.


Leche described Wallace as a quiet, easygoing man and conscientious worker who loved books, opera and the outdoors.


He had asked for vacation time to camp and hike at Yellowstone, a park he had visited before, Leche said.