A large bull moose spent more than an hour stomping on the sled dog team of a rookie Iditarod musher near Fairbanks last week — and the attack didn’t end even after Bridgett Watkins emptied her gun into the animal.
"She said no musher would ever travel with a rifle or a large caliber gun, instead preferring to scare off animals with a flare gun." and "She did carry a .380 caliber gun because there are few people where she trains, and she keeps it to to deter or scare off animals. She has since upgraded to a larger caliber firearm after it didn’t stop the moose."
@ Unknown - I read that part when I read the story earlier elsewhere. That woman is nuts to be out anywhere, alone, at any time in Alaska, without adequate firepower. She's lucky the moose didn't stomp her too. She probably surprised it as it was climbing into the saddle. I'd be pissed too. ;-))
This happened not far from my house. Been a rough winter this year; moose are getting cranky. https://dailydispatch.dps.alaska.gov/Home/Display?dateReceived=1/20/2022%2012:00:00%20AM
Near the bottom is the advisory kucked out by ADF&G
Had seen this being discussed elsewhere before caliber information came out, and someone had joked, 'What did she have? A .380?'. Can't believe an experienced musher would be out there with something that small.
There is an old pic of the remains of a jogger that had been partially eaten by a grizzly. In the pic you can see his thigh has been picked clean of meat but in his dead hand is an empty .38 revolver...I don't know if you can still find it on the interwebz. The story went on to say that they finally shot the grizzly a few miles away with six .38 bullets in it--the fatal shot was from the ranger's rifle.
When using a .380, 9mm, other small pistol calibers, feral hogs take 2-3 bullets to stop, and larger animals take 6-7+ directly to the head before they stop moving. No exit wounds.
If I was made of money, I would get a .44mag, .454casull, or a pocket AR...
Carry an adequate Caliber rifle or a 12 gauge shotgun with slugs. You are on a dog sled NOT backpacking you have the space and a long gun adds a few extra pounds. A .380 in marginal for human vermin at best. For a moose rifle calibers should be the largest caliber you can shoot accurately
She probably did kill the moose.....it just took several hours for it to die. One of the main reasons to carry enough gun in the wilds is to insure a humane kill.
I worked for a trailer park, as a maintenance man, and my boss had lived and worked there for a couple of decades. He had 2 kids who also worked at the park, and they never left their cities to walk into the woods without a powerful handgun, at the least. The youngest, Josh, even told me that on more than one occasion, a cop stopped them at the trailhead, and asked them if they were adequately armed, this while they were still in high school. I don't remember the city they lived in, but while not one of the bigger ones, it was a well known one. The police in their area were pretty good as far as being more concerned with common sense, instead of trying to follow dumb rules to make the township money. And my friends always carried a .44 magnum, 6" barrel, revolver. The boss was a driver on the Alaska Pipeline. He told me about some of the rules associated with it, and they are unreal. If the truck they were driving for some reason had to stop, they had to put buckets under the engine and gas fill tanks. If they left so much as a single drip of gas or oil on the snow, they called a Hazmat event, and called everyone and his brother, had to write a report, and it was a really big deal. The one thing that he told me, that really struck home, was that while driving in remote areas of Alaska, they never drove past a stopped truck/trailer rig. To do so quite seriously could mean death of the driver that you drove by. My told me that they carried a coffee can with a candle in it, and shut the tractor tight with curtains, and just the heat from the candle was enough to keep the cab warm enough to keep from freezing, in normal times. On the other hand, my cousin, that I was very close to, lived there a couple of times, and they loved it. She just moved down to the lower 48 to be closer to her mom, who is now quite old and she wants to stay closer to her, so that she can have her grandchildren, and now, great children near her. And my cousin lived in a town, where they had a garage to keep their cars in, and lived pretty much like they do in the lower part of the country. Myself, I live in Michigan, and I hate the cold, but for the past 20 years or so, we have seen a slow but steady lessening of snow over the years, and yet the same average temperatures. I put up with the cold because of the many good things about the state, from the natural beauty to the outdoor sports, from hunting and fishing, to the other things that allow people to just enjoy the beauty of the outdoors, from hiking to skying, the lakes, picture taking, etc. Now if we could just take the bottom 1/4 of the south east of the state, and sink it deeply into the ground and cover it up with dirt, the state would approach perfection.
This reminds me of a discussion board I was on a few years back. There were some fools planning a camping trip in grizzly bear country with 7.62 x 25 Tokarev pistols for protection because penetration tests on Box O' Truth showed that it had phenomenal penetration on things like a kevlar helmet and a box of wooden dowels - with 3 layers of denim over it!.
With moose or bear you need a round that will break bone. These animals don’t register pain and panic at “being shot”. They stop when their bodies are stopped.
My heaviest rounds are .300 win mag, .357 magnum and .40 sw. (oh and 12 ga)
An aside if you are not very good with a handgun. Carry a rifle as well. Most people are NOT good enough especially in a crisis situation to make a killing hit with a handgun of any caliber. I have a 460 S&W and a .338 lapua I would carry the Lapua over the handgun. I would also have a ghost right Ironsight installed as well.
Pigpen51's comments reminded me of something from when we lived in Fairbanks. A lady I knew had retired from a state agency that sent people out into the bush frequently, and had a photo on her desk of her and her officemates. One lady in the front had no arms below the elbows - just hooks. I asked about it.
Seems the agency had declared that employees would not carry guns in the field. Some disobeyed. The lady in question did obey. And one day a bear ate her arms off. I suppose she was lucky to escape with her life.
"and with all the jostling of the sled a larger gun might go off." SMH
ReplyDeleteI know, and in the same interview she said:
Delete"She said no musher would ever travel with a rifle or a large caliber gun, instead preferring to scare off animals with a flare gun." and "She did carry a .380 caliber gun because there are few people where she trains, and she keeps it to to deter or scare off animals. She has since upgraded to a larger caliber firearm after it didn’t stop the moose."
Moron, party of one?
@ Unknown - I read that part when I read the story earlier elsewhere. That woman is nuts to be out anywhere, alone, at any time in Alaska, without adequate firepower. She's lucky the moose didn't stomp her too. She probably surprised it as it was climbing into the saddle. I'd be pissed too. ;-))
DeleteNemo
It's a known flaw with Baldwin Gunworks firearms.
DeleteThis happened not far from my house. Been a rough winter this year; moose are getting cranky.
ReplyDeletehttps://dailydispatch.dps.alaska.gov/Home/Display?dateReceived=1/20/2022%2012:00:00%20AM
Near the bottom is the advisory kucked out by ADF&G
Had seen this being discussed elsewhere before caliber information came out, and someone had joked, 'What did she have? A .380?'. Can't believe an experienced musher would be out there with something that small.
ReplyDeleteThere is an old pic of the remains of a jogger that had been partially eaten by a grizzly. In the pic you can see his thigh has been picked clean of meat but in his dead hand is an empty .38 revolver...I don't know if you can still find it on the interwebz. The story went on to say that they finally shot the grizzly a few miles away with six .38 bullets in it--the fatal shot was from the ranger's rifle.
ReplyDeleteWhen using a .380, 9mm, other small pistol calibers, feral hogs take 2-3 bullets to stop, and larger animals take 6-7+ directly to the head before they stop moving. No exit wounds.
ReplyDeleteIf I was made of money, I would get a .44mag, .454casull, or a pocket AR...
-arc
Carry an adequate Caliber rifle or a 12 gauge shotgun with slugs. You are on a dog sled NOT backpacking you have the space and a long gun adds a few extra pounds. A .380 in marginal for human vermin at best. For a moose rifle calibers should be the largest caliber you can shoot accurately
DeleteShe probably did kill the moose.....it just took several hours for it to die. One of the main reasons to carry enough gun in the wilds is to insure a humane kill.
ReplyDeleteA .380 is just enough to piss off a moose. She should look into .308. Same numbers but a huge difference.
ReplyDeleteI'll bet she upgraded to 9x18.
ReplyDeleteThats a mouse gun, stupid. Not a moose gun.
ReplyDeleteI wonder how many rounds she fired in the air to try to scare the moose before she actually tried to stop it.
ReplyDeleteI worked for a trailer park, as a maintenance man, and my boss had lived and worked there for a couple of decades. He had 2 kids who also worked at the park, and they never left their cities to walk into the woods without a powerful handgun, at the least.
ReplyDeleteThe youngest, Josh, even told me that on more than one occasion, a cop stopped them at the trailhead, and asked them if they were adequately armed, this while they were still in high school. I don't remember the city they lived in, but while not one of the bigger ones, it was a well known one.
The police in their area were pretty good as far as being more concerned with common sense, instead of trying to follow dumb rules to make the township money. And my friends always carried a .44 magnum, 6" barrel, revolver. The boss was a driver on the Alaska Pipeline. He told me about some of the rules associated with it, and they are unreal.
If the truck they were driving for some reason had to stop, they had to put buckets under the engine and gas fill tanks. If they left so much as a single drip of gas or oil on the snow, they called a Hazmat event, and called everyone and his brother, had to write a report, and it was a really big deal.
The one thing that he told me, that really struck home, was that while driving in remote areas of Alaska, they never drove past a stopped truck/trailer rig. To do so quite seriously could mean death of the driver that you drove by. My told me that they carried a coffee can with a candle in it, and shut the tractor tight with curtains, and just the heat from the candle was enough to keep the cab warm enough to keep from freezing, in normal times.
On the other hand, my cousin, that I was very close to, lived there a couple of times, and they loved it. She just moved down to the lower 48 to be closer to her mom, who is now quite old and she wants to stay closer to her, so that she can have her grandchildren, and now, great children near her. And my cousin lived in a town, where they had a garage to keep their cars in, and lived pretty much like they do in the lower part of the country. Myself, I live in Michigan, and I hate the cold, but for the past 20 years or so, we have seen a slow but steady lessening of snow over the years, and yet the same average temperatures. I put up with the cold because of the many good things about the state, from the natural beauty to the outdoor sports, from hunting and fishing, to the other things that allow people to just enjoy the beauty of the outdoors, from hiking to skying, the lakes, picture taking, etc. Now if we could just take the bottom 1/4 of the south east of the state, and sink it deeply into the ground and cover it up with dirt, the state would approach perfection.
". . . they never drove past a stopped truck/trailer rig. To do so quite seriously could mean death of the driver that you drove by."
DeleteWhy? Explain.
If nobody else drove by the driver could freeze to death.
DeleteThis reminds me of a discussion board I was on a few years back.
ReplyDeleteThere were some fools planning a camping trip in grizzly bear country with 7.62 x 25 Tokarev pistols for protection because penetration tests on Box O' Truth showed that it had phenomenal penetration on things like a kevlar helmet and a box of wooden dowels - with 3 layers of denim over it!.
She hasn't heard of Fort Scott ammo?
ReplyDeleteWith moose or bear you need a round that will break bone. These animals don’t register pain and panic at “being shot”. They stop when their bodies are stopped.
ReplyDeleteMy heaviest rounds are .300 win mag, .357 magnum and .40 sw. (oh and 12 ga)
An aside if you are not very good with a handgun. Carry a rifle as well. Most people are NOT good enough especially in a crisis situation to make a killing hit with a handgun of any caliber. I have a 460 S&W and a .338 lapua I would carry the Lapua over the handgun. I would also have a ghost right Ironsight installed as well.
ReplyDeletePigpen51's comments reminded me of something from when we lived in Fairbanks. A lady I knew had retired from a state agency that sent people out into the bush frequently, and had a photo on her desk of her and her officemates. One lady in the front had no arms below the elbows - just hooks. I asked about it.
ReplyDeleteSeems the agency had declared that employees would not carry guns in the field. Some disobeyed. The lady in question did obey. And one day a bear ate her arms off. I suppose she was lucky to escape with her life.
This lady said an awful lot of stupid things. Methinks she should go back to the city and stay out of the woods.
ReplyDelete