But I’m getting ahead of myself. This week my colleague Lila Seidman told the story of the black bear at the center of the debate. Nicknamed Victor, the bear was beloved by locals and known to ...

Steve Searles, a Mammoth Lakes resident known as “the Bear Whisperer,” told me he’d go to the Lakes Basin to spend time with Victor. Searles described Victor as a friendly creature with the ...

New Mexicans will surely remember watching the Smokey Bear balloon crash into a radio tower, putting the lives of the pilot and two young boys in jeopardy. Thursday was the 20th anniversary of ...

Complicating the situation further, this wasn’t just any bear. Many people in town knew him as “Victor.” Reports of human-black bear interactions have been on the rise across the country for ...

a large chocolate-colored bear male named Victor wandered up to their picnic table. They were regulars in the area, and Victor was easy to tell apart from other bears not only due to his size ...

It's been 20 years since Smokey Bear, a hot air balloon, struck a 670-foot radio tower west of New Mexico's Balloon Fiesta Park. It happened on Oct. 10, 2004. The hot air balloon became entangled ...