Video of train 'mowing down bear' shocks Russians
AFP
December 6, 2014, 3:11 am
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Russians reacted with shock Friday and prosecutors launched an inquiry after a YouTube video went viral showing a train apparently mowing down a bear on the tracks as the driver shouts "crush him!"
Shot at night from the front of a train, the video shows the train speeding through a snowy landscape, as a bear with snow on its back can be seen vainly attempting to outrun it on the tracks ahead.
"Be quiet!" a male voice can be heard saying, before shouting: "Crush him! Crush him!". As the bear disappears under the front of the train, the man shouts: "Got him!"
The reflection of a phone being used to make the video can be seen in the train's windscreen. At the end, the buttons of a dashboard can be seen, showing that it was shot in the train's cabin.
Rossiya 24 news channel condemned what it called a "monstrous incident." Photo: Supplied
The video on YouTube has been watched more than 70,000 times.
Rossiya 24 news channel condemned what it called a "monstrous incident."
Transport prosecutors in Norilsk, a Siberian city around 3,000 kilometres (1,800 miles) northeast of Moscow beyond the Arctic Circle, said they were looking into what happened.
They said that the video was believed to have been shot around 2 am on Thursday on private tracks used by the metals giant Norilsk Nickel inside the city of Norilsk.
"Watching the video, we got the impression that the train's crew is deliberately speeding up and isn't trying to avoid a collision," Oksana Gorbunova, a senior aide to West Siberian transport prosecutors, told NTV television.
"We are carrying out a check not because we are sorry for the bear but to check the legality of the crew's actions."
A spokesman for Norilsk Nickel later told Govorit Moskva radio station that the bear had apparently survived after being hit by the snow plough on the front of the train.
"We contacted our colleagues in Norilsk. They said the bear is alive. The board on the front that is used to clean snow from tracks just threw the bear onto the verge," spokesman Pyotr Likholitov said, adding "the animal probably did not suffer serious injuries."
Searchers will look for the wounded bear, which could be aggressive and pose a danger to people, Gazeta.ru news site reported, citing Norilsk Nickel staff.
