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Two Brown Bears Escape Enclosure, Devour Week’s Supply of Honey

Park officials are investigating an operational lapse that allowed the bears to access a staff food area

Overview

  • Mish and Lucy, five-year-old European brown bears, slipped out of their Wildwood Devon enclosure on June 23 and made a beeline for the park’s food storage facility
  • The siblings consumed roughly a week’s worth of honey along with fresh fruits and vegetables before settling into a sugar-induced nap
  • Staff monitored the bears via CCTV and on-site teams used recall training to coax them back into their enclosure within an hour
  • Visitors were guided to secure buildings as a precaution and police, including a firearms unit, were deployed though no public threat materialized
  • Wildwood Devon reopened the following day after confirming the enclosure’s structural integrity and reassuring visitors that the bears remained safe