A moose out grazing this week on the lush vegetation of what’s normally a downhill ski run in the winter suddenly attacked a female athlete who was part of a group competing in a race up the hill.
It’s become popular in recent years for Norwegians to run up steep ski runs, part of a relatively new sport called motbakke among local enthusiasts.
Things turned dramatic Monday evening at a motbakke event at the Varingskollen Ski Center in Nittedal, just north of Oslo. A moose continued grazing on the hill, “very calmly,” according one participant, even after the racers started running nearby.
At one point, some racers feared the large animal would be disturbed by people running by it, and chased it away. The moose wandered over to a parallel ski run, but eventually returned and continued eating.
Then, without warning, it attacked a female participant. She had apparently tried to shoo it away from some small children herself, but fell and the moose apparently kicked her in the leg. She suffered a large cut and possible fracture.
Operations leader Arild Ruud of the Romerike Police District said the woman was taken to Akershus University Hospital, and wildlife officials were looking for the moose, worried it would attack again.
The racers “apparently had wandered onto the moose’s dinner table, and he didn’t like that,”one witness told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK). For a photo of the moose and the victim, click here (external link, in Norwegian).
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