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A mother-of-three survived a horrific bear attack where she was hidden by the beast under foliage to be feasted on at a later stage.
Natalya Pasternak had visited the woods with her dog and her 80-year-old friend Valentina Gorodetskaya to collect birch sap when they encountered the creature in Russia back in 2015.
The 55-year-old explained how her first thought was to flee but worried that the bear would kill her mate she hesitated when it came for her near their home in Tynda, in the Amur region of Siberia, roughly 120 miles north of China.
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Speaking to The Siberian Times, she said: ""When I saw the bear, I tried to escape. Then I remembered about my friend and stopped. That was the moment when the predator attacked me."
It was her pet that alerted the women of the danger, as it barked moments before it attacked the mom and grandma.
She continued: "The animal started to tear my legs apart and I tried to attack him with something I was using to collect birch sap.
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"Then a quick thought hit me: 'If the bear takes my legs, I'll be disabled for the rest of my life. It's better to die then to be a burden to my children'."
The former baker went on to describe her struggles with the bear, telling how she tried to strike its eyes and neck but it was too powerful for her.
Courageously, her Gorodetskaya wasn't letting her age stop her from defending her as she began striking the bear herself.
"Valentina was also hitting the bear with a stick and praying. For some time the bear switched to her and hit her on her back. Then it started tearing me apart again," Pasternak explained.
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"Valentina escaped and, despite her age, she made it to a water cleaning facility and called the emergency services."
When Gorodetskaya left, the beast then began burying Pasternak as it apparently had assumed she was dead.
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"Despite such a nightmare I didn't go mad. A prayer that I was screaming out loud helped me," the postal worker said.
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But it was hunter Sergei Ivanov who arrived on the scene to rescue Pasternak, shooting the animal - which he explained had been 'guarding' Pasternak, who was partially buried underneath a pile of leaves.
"I looked and saw a woman, almost completed buried. Only her bloodied face and one arm was sticking out, but she was alive and breathing," Ivanov said.
"She asked, 'Did you kill the bear?'. Then she said, 'Dig me out'."
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The ordeal happened back in 2015, and while Gorodetskaya managed to escape without the need of medical assistance, Pasternak was hospital-bound.
"I'm feeling well now and they're helping me a lot in the hospital," she said at the time.
"I can now stand up and walk a little bit with the help of my daughter.
"It's terrible to imagine what could have happened if it wasn't for Valentina."
Topics: Russia, Nature, World News
Joe Yates