Two hungry bears in Alaska raided a Krispy Kreme doughnut van that was making deliveries on a military base.
The driver was outside a convenience store when it happened last Tuesday at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson.
“There’s no way that bears are in the back of the van,” store manager Candace Sargeant thought when she first got the call from her driver. “And I was like, ‘OK how do we solve this?'”
The driver had left the van briefly unattended as he made a regular delivery to an express store on base. What he didn’t know is that a mama black bear and her cubs were regular customers outside the store and that morning they were on the prowl for something sweet to eat.
“She was happy because she’d been looking for garbage,” said convenience store manager Shelly Deano.
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She heard noises coming from the van and quickly realized what was happening.
“I said he’s in the van and then the little cub followed and went inside the van and they just started eating the doughnuts,” Deano said.
Deano snapped a few pictures of the hungry bears chowing down.
“You could hear them breaking open the packages. We were trying to beat on the van but they just kept eating on the doughnuts. They ate 20 packages of the doughnut holes and I believe six packages of the three pack chocolate doughnuts,” Deano said.
The experience has led the Krispy Kreme crew to do things a little differently in the future.
“We’ll definitely be learning to slide up our ramp, close the doors to ensure that bears don’t get back in there again,” said Sargeant.
Base security used loud sirens to finally get the bears to leave the van. After that, the bears ambled off into the woods.
A statement from the military says it has concerns about bears attracted to human food and are working to address the situation with the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
