NORTH MYRTLE BEACH, SC (WMBF) – A North Myrtle Beach woman woke up Sunday to a mystery in her backyard, and the answer was caught on camera.
Lori White, who lives in the Park Pointe neighborhood, stepped outside to find her back gate ripped completely off its hinges. At first, she wasn’t sure what to think.
“I sort of stood there staring at it for a minute or so,” she said. “The first thing that came to mind was that somebody must’ve hit it with a lawnmower, but then obviously realized that couldn’t have happened overnight.”
Bear rips gate off hinges in North Myrtle Beach neighborhood(Lori White)
It was not until she noticed her birdfeeder had been knocked over that the real culprit came to mind.
“I immediately thought that it could’ve been a bear,” she said. “I ran inside to get my phone to look at the cameras, and there it was.”
Security camera footage captured a large bear roaming her yard around 10:40 p.m. Saturday, just feet from her bedroom window, where a light was still on. She said neither she nor her two dogs heard a thing.
Another video shows the bear licking White’s bird feeder.
Park Pointe sits across the street from the North Myrtle Beach Park and Sports Complex.
While White said she had heard of bear sightings in the area before, this was her first personal encounter. She believes nearby development may be pushing the animals closer to homes.
“There is a new neighborhood going in just past our neighborhood,” she said. “With all the trees that are being cut down, it does not surprise me that we have these animals roaming our neighborhoods.”
White has filed a report with the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources.
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