24-Year-Old Mother and 1-Year-Old Son Killed in Alaska Polar Bear Attack

The victims of a polar bear attack on Tuesday in the remote Alaskan village of Wales include a 24-year-old woman and her 1-year-old son. According to

a press release by the Alaska Department of Public Safety on Wednesday, the victims of the attack were Summer Myomick and her son Clyde Ongtowasruk. The Anchorage Daily News

reported that the mother and son were walking between the Kingikmiut School building and a clinic when the bear entered the community and mauled the pair near the front entrance

of the Kingikmiut School building at approximately 2:30 p.m. As the attack unfolded, according to the Associated Press, community members and employees from the school

emerged to try to scare the animal away with shovels. The polar bear chased them back into the school, prompting the school's principal to slam the door to keep it out.

"The bear tried to enter with them," Susan R. Nedza, the chief school administrator for the Bering Strait School District, told the Anchorage Daily News. RELATED: Polar

Bear Shot Dead After It Kills Woman and Boy in Alaska During 'Rare' Attack Wales, a remote town of approximately 150 people, is located on the Seward Peninsula and is the

westernmost point of the U.S. mainland, abutting the Bering Strait. While experts believe that receding ice in the area may be to blame for the bear's interaction with

the town, a GoFundMe account for the family's next-of-kin states that this was the first fatal polar bear attack in Alaska in over 30 years.