A woman in her sixties was mauled to death by a brown bear outside her home on the edge of a remote forest.

The victim, identified by Russian media only as Lyudmila T, was found around 50ft from her house in Verkhniy Kebezh, in Russia’s Krasnoyarsk region. She’d died at the scene from injuries that investigators said were consistent with an attack by a wild animal.

Local reports said that she lived alone in a house on the edge of the village, close to dense woodland. She was due to celebrate her 67th birthday in little more than a month.

The bear is believed to have entered her garden during the night of September 16. The garden fence was found damaged, while scratches were discovered on the wooden wall beneath an open window.

Early accounts claimed that the animal had broken into the property and dragged the woman from her bedroom. Russia’s Investigative Committee confirmed that she had been killed near her home, but those people looking into what happened reportedly found no evidence that the bear had actually entered the house.

Authorities believe that the 66 year-old was most likely attacked outside. One possibility being examined is that she heard a disturbance in the garden and went to see what was happening.

Emergency service sources quoted by Russian news agency TASS said that Lyudmila may have heard a noise in her garden and looked through the window, at which point the bear grabbed her.

That account hasn’t been conclusively established and the investigation into the circumstances of her death is continuing. Officials have confirmed that a window had been left open for ventilation, but haven’t said precisely how Lyudmila came to be outside.

A neighbour was staying at the house on the night of the incident and was reportedly asleep on a mattress beneath the window. She wasn’t injured.

The fence around the front garden was also damaged, leading officials to suspect that the bear had climbed or forced its way onto the land. Photographs released from the scene show marks on the outside of the house.

The animal had disappeared by the time that police arrived. Hunters and officers were still searching for it when the authorities issued their initial account.

Verkhniy Kebezh is a small settlement in the Ermakovsky district of southern Krasnoyarsk in Siberia.

Russia’s Natural Resources Ministry said that around 20 to 30 bear attacks are recorded across the country in a typical year.

Officials have linked some encounters to animals finding easily available food in bins and open waste containers.

Lyudmila T was the fourth person killed by a bear in the Krasnoyarsk area in just a matter of weeks.

There have been at least 12 bear-related deaths recorded across Russia since the beginning of 2026.

The country’s estimated brown bear population has also risen considerably over recent decades.

Ministry figures put it at approximately 307,900 in 2026, compared with about 130,000 in 1990.

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