CBS News
Alaska man killed in moose attack was trying to take photos of newborn calves, troopers say
A 70-year-old Alaska man who was attempting to take photos of two newborn moose calves was attacked and killed by their mother, authorities said Monday.
The man killed Sunday was identified as Dale Chorman of Homer, said Austin McDaniel, a spokesperson for the Alaska Department of Public Safety.
The female moose had recently given birth to the calves in Homer.
“As they were walking through the brush looking for the moose, that’s when the cow moose attacked Dale,” McDaniel said.
The attack happened as the two were running away, he said. The second man, who has not been publicly identified, was uninjured.
That person did not witness the attack, so authorities cannot say if the moose killed Chorman by kicking or stomping him, or a combination.
Medics pronounced Chorman dead at the scene. The cow moose left the area, Alaska State Troopers said in an online post.
The Anchorage Daily News reported that his son, Nathan Spence-Chorman, wrote on social media that his father “died on his property, tromping through the woods with a dear friend, in pursuit of a great photograph.”
“Dale was highly experienced around wildlife. He was intimately familiar with nature, and had no naivete about its danger. This was not a hapless fool stumbling into danger — this was a person who went out looking for a great photo, knowing the risks, and got caught in a dangerous moment,” Nathan Spence-Chorman wrote, according to the newspaper, adding: “The moose, obviously, is not at fault.”
Mark Thiessen / AP
In 1995, a female moose stomped a 71-year-old man to death when he was trying to enter a building on the campus of the University of Alaska Anchorage. Witnesses said students had been throwing snowballs and harassing the moose and its calf for hours, and the animals were agitated when the man tried to walk past them. That moose was killed by wildlife officials.
There are up to 200,000 moose in Alaska, a state with a human population of about 737,000.
The animals are not normally aggressive but can become so if provoked, according to the state Department of Fish and Game’s website.
A cow moose will become very protective over young calves and will attack humans who come too close, the department says.
“Calving season for moose is the time when you definitely want to give them extra space,” McDaniel said. “Cow moose with calves are going to be some of the more aggressive moose you’re going to come in contact with.”
People should not spook the animals or get between a mother and her calves, he said.
“Those moose will become unpredictable and work to protect their calves at any cost,” McDaniel said.
The largest of the deer family, a small adult female moose can weigh up to 800 pounds, while a large adult male can weigh twice that, according to Fish and Game. The animals can stand almost 6 feet tall.
Last September, a moose attacked and injured a woman and her dog in Colorado. Authorities said the cow moose headbutted the woman and stomped on her multiple times. Just days before that, a moose in Colorado charged and trampled a hiker whose dog started barking at the animal while walking along a trail.
The following is a transcript of an interview with Sen. Mark Kelly, Democrat of Arizona, on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” that aired on Oct. 6, 2024.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Joining us now is Arizona’s Democratic Senator, Mark Kelly. He’s in Detroit this morning on the campaign trail for the Harris campaign. Good morning to you, Senator.
SEN. MARK KELLY: Good morning, Margaret.
MARGARET BRENNAN: I want to talk to you about Arizona, but let’s start in Michigan, which is where you are right now. And it is going to be such a key state to a potential Harris or Trump victory. Vice President Harris is facing challenges among black men, working class people, as well as the Muslim and Arab populations skeptical of the White House support for Israel’s wars. What are you hearing on the ground there from voters?
SEN. KELLY: Well, my wife, Gabby Giffords, and I have been out here for a couple days. We’ve been campaigning across the country, Michigan, I’ve been in North Carolina, Georgia as well. I’ll be back to Arizona here soon. The vice president was out here speaking to Muslim organizations and the Arab community about what is at stake in this election and addressing the concerns that they have. What we’re hearing, issues about the economy, about gun violence, about, you know, supporting American families and the difference between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. You know, Kamala Harris, who has a vision for the future of this country, Donald Trump, who just wants to drag us backwards.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Today in Dearborn, Michigan, there’s a funeral service for an American man who was killed in Lebanon by an Israeli airstrike. It just underscores how that community you’re talking about out in Michigan feel some of what’s happening in a personal way to their community. Given how close this race is, do you think this war and the expectation it could escalate could cost Democrats both a seat in the Senate and potentially the presidency?
SEN. KELLY: Margaret, nobody wants to see escalation and it’s tragic when any innocent person, whether it’s an American or Palestinian, lose their life in a conflict. Tomorrow’s one year since October 7th, when Israel was violently attacked. Israel has a right to defend itself, not only from Hamas, but from Hezbollah and from the Iranians. But, you know, I and my wife, you know, we feel for the community here who’s been affected by this. And that’s why the vice president was out here earlier, a few days ago, meeting with that community.
MARGARET BRENNAN: But it’s a live issue.
SEN. KELLY: Yeah, sure. I mean, there is an ongoing conflict in the Middle East. Israel is, you know, fighting a war now on, I think it’s fair to say, two fronts and then being attacked by the Iranians as well. And, they- they need to defend themselves, and we need to support our Israeli ally. At the same time, when women and children lose their life, innocent people in a conflict, it is- it is tragic.
MARGARET BRENNAN: You do sit on the Senate Intelligence Committee and so I know you know how intense the efforts are by foreign actors to try to manipulate voters going into November. Just this Friday, Matthew Olsen, the lead on election threats at the Department of Justice, told CBS the Russians are, quote, highlighting immigration as a wedge issue. That is such a key issue in Arizona. Are you seeing targeted information operations really focusing in on Arizonans right now?
SEN. KELLY: Not only in Arizona, in other battleground states. It’s the Russians, the Chinese, the Iranians, and it’s significant. And we need to do a better job getting the message out to the American people that there is a huge amount of misinformation. If you’re looking at stuff on Twitter, on TikTok, on Facebook, on Instagram, and it’s political in nature, and you may- might think that that person responding to that political article or who made that meme up is an American. It could be- it could look like a U.S. service member. There is a very reasonable chance I would put it in the 20 to 30% range, that the content you are seeing, the comments you are seeing, are coming from one of those three countries: Russia, Iran, China. We had a hearing recently, with the FBI director, the DNI, and the head of the National Security Agency. And we talked about this. And we talked about getting the word out. And it’s up to us, so thank you for asking me the question, because it’s up to us, the people who serve in Congress and the White House to get the information out there, that there is a tremendous amount of misinformation in this election, and it’s not going to stop on November 5th.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Understood. And we will do our best to help parse that for viewers. But on the topic of the border, President Biden did announce just this past week new regulations to keep in place that partial asylum ban that he rolled out back in June. That’s what’s credited with helping to bring down some of the border crossing numbers in recent weeks. It was supposed to be a temporary policy, dependent on how many people were crossing at a time. Do you think this is the right long term policy, or is this just a gimmick to bring down numbers ahead of the election?
SEN. KELLY: Well, the right long term policy is to do this through legislation. And we were a day or two away from doing that, passing strong border security legislation supported by the vice president, negotiated by the vice president, and the president and his Department of Homeland Security, with Democrats and Republicans–
MARGARET BRENNAN: But this is not legislation.
SEN. KELLY: –This is bipartisan. This isn’t. But the legislation was killed by Donald Trump. We were really close to getting it passed. That’s the correct way to do this. When you can’t do that, Margaret, when a former president interrupts the legislative process the way he did, which is the most hypocritical thing I’ve ever seen in my three and a half years in the Senate. After that happened, the only other option is executive actions. And this has gone from what was chaos and a crisis at our southern border to somewhat manageable. And if you’re the border- Border Patrol, you know, this is this- you need this. I mean, otherwise it is unsafe for Border Patrol agents, for CBP officers, for migrants, for communities in southern Arizona. So it’s unfortunate that this was the- these were the steps that had to be taken.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Okay.
SEN. KELLY: But that’s because the former president didn’t allow us to do this through legislation.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Senator, we have to leave it right there. Face the Nation will be right back.
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.
CBS News
Sen. Mark Kelly says Americans need to know about “huge amount of misinformation” on election
Watch CBS News
Be the first to know
Get browser notifications for breaking news, live events, and exclusive reporting.