The uncle of a man who was killed by a grizzly bear in Canada’s Banff National Park has revealed a chilling distress message that came from the victim’s Garmin InReach GPS device on the evening of the attack. Colin Inglis received the message in a phone call from Garmin around 8 p.m. on September 29, he told Global News, in a nearly six minute-long sit-down interview.
“At 4:52 [p.m.], I got a message saying ‘We’re delayed, but everything is OK,’” Inglis said. “That message would mean that they were in a camp, their camp was setup, they were probably making dinner … things were good.”
Though the exact timeline is unclear, Doug Inglis and Jenny Gusse came into contact with a female grizzly bear sometime after they sent that message to both Colin Inglis (Doug’s uncle) and Jenny’s mother. “[At] 8:15, the phone rings, I got a phone call from Garmin, who inReach belongs to,” Doug Inglis told Global News. “And the message was, ‘We’ve had an SOS…not only was the SOS activated, but there was a message input into the SOS that said: Bear Attack. Bad.’ At that point, we knew something was happening that was very bad. They were in trouble.”
Search and Rescue Team Attacked
As previously reported, both Inglis and Gusse were killed during the attack, along with their border collie. A Parks Canada emergency crew was dispatched, but inclement weather delayed their arrival by several hours. When the crew finally made it to the area where the couple’s inReach device was pinging, they first encountered a bear safe food container hanging from a tree.
“Five minutes later, at 1:15 [a.m.], [the rescue team] were attacked by this bear,” Inglis said. “In their words, it meant them serious harm. They obviously used their weapons and killed the bear.” A necropsy later revealed that the bear was a non-lactating sow. Judging by the condition of its teeth, Parks Canada determined that it was at least 25 years old if not older and “had less than normal body fat for this time of year.”
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Evidence gathered by Parks Canada officials at the campsite suggested that the couple had retired to their tent for the night when the attack began. The tent was crushed, Inglis said, with their shoes and E-readers still inside. Their bodies were found outside of the tent next to their dog and an empty can of bear spray.
In a separate interview with NPR, Colin Inglis said that Doug and Jenny were skilled backcountry enthusiasts with who enjoyed numerous such journeys in their many years together. “They have been together almost entirely since they went to university,” he reaclled. “They’ve been a team, completely, in all aspects of their lives, whether it be work, at home, gardening, or canoeing or hiking. They were wonderful people.”
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