The Japanese archipelago has been gripped by bear fear. Human casualties from so-called "urban bears" roaming down from the mountains into city centers have soared to the worst level on record this year. Since April, deaths from bear attacks have climbed to a record 7. As bears descending on residential areas for food grow increasingly bold, the Japanese government even changed the law to allow municipalities to immediately shoot bears to death on their own judgment.
Kyodo News and Yomiuri Shimbun and other major Japanese media said on the 17th that a 60-year-old hot spring facility worker went missing after a bear attack in Iwate Prefecture in northeastern Japan. Police presumed the missing employee was dragged away by a bear while cleaning, leaving behind only glasses, sandals, and cleaning tools.
Five days earlier, on the 12th, a 70-year-old man delivering newspapers was killed in a residential neighborhood in Fukushima Town, Hokkaido, after being attacked by a massive brown bear measuring 2 meters in length and weighing 218 kilograms. On the 3rd of this month, in the mountains of Kurihara, Miyagi Prefecture, a woman in her 70s, Shimizu Harue, 75, died after a bear attack while foraging for mushrooms. Of the group of four who accompanied her, another woman remains missing to this day, more than two weeks later. Shimizu, who died, was reportedly the owner of a restaurant that cooked and sold dishes using mushrooms she harvested herself. A man who was with them at the time said, "We set off three firecrackers to scare off the bear, but it seems the noise actually attracted it."
Bear damage knows no borders. In Iwate Prefecture, horrific incidents erupted one after another. On the 4th, an Asiatic black bear broke into a private home in Kitakami and killed an 81-year-old woman. It was the first case of a bear entering a house and taking a human life. On the 8th, a man in his 70s who went to pick mushrooms in a forest in the same city of Kitakami was found dead. Days later, the headless body of a man was discovered, among other deaths suspected to be the work of bears.
According to the Environment Ministry, deaths from bear attacks have reached 7 since the start of the fiscal year in April. Two people each were killed in Hokkaido and Iwate Prefecture, and one each in Miyagi, Akita, and Nagano prefectures. That is the highest figure since statistics began in 2006, surpassing the previous record of 6 in 2023. The number of injured also far exceeded 100.
It is not just fatal accidents. Bear appearances themselves have surged. In Japan, bears have now encroached on everyday spaces such as hot springs, supermarkets, and bus stops. At the Iizaka Onsen resort in Fukushima Prefecture, a bear wandered around parking lots and lodging facilities for 10 hours, forcing a shutdown. In a grocery store in Numata, Gunma Prefecture, just north of Tokyo, a 1.4-meter bear entered, attacked two shoppers, rummaged through the fish and sushi sections, and even stomped on avocados in a rampage. In Shirakawa-go village in Gifu Prefecture, a UNESCO World Heritage site, a Spanish tourist waiting for a bus was attacked by a bear.
In hard-hit Akita Prefecture, as of Oct. 12, bear sightings topped 5,400, with 32 injured and 1 dead. In September alone, 39 people were injured by bear attacks across Japan, the highest September figure in the past decade.
Japanese media said a complex mix of factors is behind this year's sharp spike in bear damage. First, climate change has dealt a poor harvest to beech nuts and other staples for bears. Ahead of hibernation, instances of bears coming down into inhabited areas in search of food have increased. In the past, bear attacks were concentrated mainly in the fall. This year, even in the spring and summer from April to June, 37 people were injured, and damage surged across seasons before fall.
Experts cited changes in Japan's social structure as a reason for the marked rise in bear damage. Like Korea, Japan is grappling with a shrinking rural population and severe aging. As rural residents decline, idle lands that served as buffers between farmland and residential areas are increasingly left unattended. The spaces vacated by people have turned into favorable habitats for bears coming down in search of food. On top of that, while bear protection policies have steadily increased the population, the number of professional hunters has plunged due to aging, making population control difficult. In the end, with more bears and less food, conditions have formed for them to descend into human-adjacent habitats in cities.
As the situation worsened, the Japanese government and local authorities took a hard line. The government has been enforcing a revised Wildlife Protection and Management Law since Sept. 1. If a bear appears in a residential area and threatens human life, a mayor can immediately commission a shooting to kill without police direction. Two days earlier, on the 15th, Sendai used the system to kill a 1.4-meter male bear that appeared in a scrub forest in a residential area. It was the first case of an "emergency shooting to kill" in Japan.
Tochigi Prefectural Police conducted a joint bear-repelling drill with the local hunting association that simulated the real thing. When a person wearing an Asiatic black bear costume appeared, they demonstrated the kill procedure in a somewhat comical program. In areas with frequent bear appearances, authorities have installed specially designed trash bins that bears cannot open or raised fierce dogs dubbed "bear dogs" to chase bears as self-help measures.
Akita Governor Suzuki Kenta said at a news conference on the 14th, "Culling is the most important task," but added, "The personnel of municipalities and hunting associations have reached their limits. Continued culling is difficult."