By Cali O'Hare, Pinedale Roundup Managing Editor, cohare@pinedaleroundup.com
SUBLETTE COUNTY — A 31-year-old Georgia man is recovering after he was attacked by a grizzly bear while elk hunting in the Wind River Mountains just after 7 a.m. on Thursday, Sept. 26. Landon Clement, an avid outdoorsmen and marathon runner, suffered a severe bite wound to his right leg but managed to escape the harrowing ordeal with his life. Clement was standing with his back against a large rock about a quarter-mile away from Crow Creek when the sow and her two yearlings approached him.
John Quintrell, a resident of the Upper Green who was in the field closest to Clement, heard the gunshots and ultimately helped evacuate the injured man, explained Clement fired at the animal several times once the attack began but it was undeterred. On the ground with the apex predator on top of him, Clement took aim at the bear again only for his gun to jam. As the grizzly sunk its teeth what Quintrell estimated was about three-inches into Clement’s right leg, Clement managed to unjam his firearm and pump a fatal shot into the bear’s skull. “His last shot was with the bear laying on top of him,” Quintrell recalled from the Pinedale Clinic moments after arriving with Clement on Thursday morning.
“That’s when he started screaming,” Quintrell added. Between the gunshots and the other sounds of the attack, the rest of Clement’s group, scattered a mile out from him, made their way to the injured hunter. Quintrell quickly examined the injury before the men transported Clement to the medical clinic in Pinedale.
Quintrell, who had been elk hunting with Clement and a few others folks all week, described the Georgia man as “the most avid hunter you’ll ever meet in your life. He’s also a marathon runner so he’s in great shape and evidently he can keep his excitement under control because he fixed that jammed gun with a bear on him, biting on his leg.”
*Editor’s note: This is a developing story and will be updated as much information becomes available.