A sheriff’s deputy in Volusia County, Florida had a shock while walking through the woods at night with a K-9 unit named Gator. Though looking for a suspect, the deputy and police dog came across a bear instead. Footage from the deputy’s body camera paired with aerial footage from a helicopter shows the whole scene unfold.
Volusia Sheriff’s Office posted the footage to Facebook, calling it “GATOR VS. BEAR.”
“This weekend, K-9 Gator was searching the woods for an aggravated battery suspect when he found a hidden forest dweller instead: His first bear,” Volusia Sheriff’s Office wrote in the post. “Both sides walked away from this encounter unharmed and with a mutual respect.”
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Local news reports that the deputy and Gator were searching for a man named Jose Murietta who is wanted in the area for assaulting someone over a debt owed.
Though the pair was in a wooded area, they weren’t too far from civilization. They were searching some woods near the Orlandia Heights subdivision in Debary. The deputy clearly didn’t expect to come across a bear, since the first thing she said was “Holy [inaudible], that’s a bear!”
Watch as a police dog comes across a bear while searching for a suspect here:
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