Two bears killed, third injured in Haines Highway collision

State Wildlife Trooper Josh Whitby and Park Ranger Jacques Turcotte talk about what might have hit a sow and cub who were killed in an apparent late-night vehicle collision on Tuesday, Sept. 15, 2026, near mile 30 of the Haines Highway. (Rashah McChesney/Chilkat Valley News)

By Rashah McChesney

Chilkat Valley News

A sow and cub were killed on the Haines Highway after being hit by a large vehicle in the upper Chilkat Valley on Tuesday night. A second cub was injured, but responding officers said they are hopeful it will survive.

It’s not clear when the bears were hit, but calls about their bodies blocking one lane near 30 Mile Haines Highway started coming in to Haines police after 10 p.m. Police sent out an emergency alert at 10:49 p.m. A passerby said she stopped to try and move them, but the cub was still alive at that point — so she left a light behind so people could see them in the road. 

By Wednesday morning, several more people had reported seeing the two dead bears and another cub that hovered nearby.  State wildlife trooper Josh Whitby and park ranger Jacques Turcotte stood by the dead sow and cub alongside the road, waiting for someone from the Department of Transportation to bring a loader to move them. 

Whitby said they’d likely be taken out into the Porcupine area so they’re out of the way of the general public. 

The two eyed the second cub, which had retreated up a nearby cottonwood and watched from a short distance away. It’s a yearling, nearing the end of its second summer, said Alaska Department of Fish and Game area management biologist Hannah Manninen. 

Because of its age, Manninen said it is old enough to survive on its own, so biologists made the decision not to euthanize it. 

But, Whitby and Turcotte said they were worried that it would also get hit because it would not leave the scene of the collision. So, they decided to try and haze it away. 

It ignored their initial efforts and kept climbing higher in the tree. Later in the afternoon, Turcotte said they were able to scare it enough that it ran uphill – that’s when he realized it had been injured, too, and was bleeding from a paw. 

Both he and Whitby said the bear appeared not to be too impacted by the wound as it was putting weight on its leg. 

Whitby said no one has reported hitting the bears, so he’s still looking for more information about who might have done it. Both speculated that it was likely a larger vehicle as there was no debris left behind as would be expected if a smaller truck or car collided with the bears. It’s not a crime to hit the bears, but state law requires that it be reported to the troopers.

• This story orginally appeared in the Chilkat Valley News.