A 47-year-old woman was gored by a bison at Yellowstone National Park on Monday, according to the National Park Service, leaving her with “significant injuries to her chest and abdomen.”
The Phoenix resident was visiting Yellowstone on Monday morning when the incident occurred. The woman was walking with another person in a field near the Lake Lodge Cabins on the north shore of Lake Yellowstone when they came across two bison.
“Upon seeing them, the visitors turned to walk away from the bison,” the National Park Service stated, but one of the bison charged at them and gored the woman.
The woman was seriously injured and had to be transported by helicopter to a hospital in Idaho, Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center.
The National Park Service had no additional information to share, and the woman’s condition is still unclear. The woman has yet to be named.
It is unknown how close the two visitors were to the bison when it charged. The National Park Service routinely warns visitors to not approach wildlife and to stay at least 23 metres (25 yards) away from large animals like bison, bighorn sheep, deer, moose, and coyotes. People should stay at least 91 metres (100 yards) from bears and wolves.
Park officials also warn that bison at this time of year are more aggressive than normal. Mating season runs from mid-July to mid-August, during which time bison can become agitated easily.
In general, officials note that bison are unpredictable and can cover large distances quickly. They can run three times faster than humans.
This is the first time in 2023 that a bison has gored someone at Yellowstone, the park service wrote.
The last reported goring incident at the park happened on June 28, 2022, when a man stepped into the path of a bison to prevent a child from being attacked. Less than a month before that incident, a woman was gored and thrown 10 feet in the air by a bison.
Yellowstone is home to just under 6,000 bison, according to a count conducted by the National Park Service in summer 2022. The large herbivores almost went extinct during the 20th century, but have lived continuously on the North American plains since prehistoric times.
Female bison can weigh up to 500 kilograms (1,000 pounds) and males can weigh almost double that.
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