An Alaskan couple were forced to flee their home after a black bear crashed through a roof skylight and proceeded to feast on a haul of cupcakes intended for their child’s birthday party.
Local media reports suggest that the lone black bear, which authorities believe may have been responsible for an earlier incursion into another family home in the area, had emerged from a nearby forest before climbing on to the roof and subsequently falling through a glass highlight that was unable to hold its 82kg weight.
"I was literally in the room, and I heard this cracking, and the next thing you know, there's this bear that, I mean, literally, fell right from (the skylight). It was like one metre away from me," homeowner Glenn Merrill told local newspaper the Juneau Empire after he and partner Alicia Bishop were forced to abandon their son's first birthday celebrations following the unusual incident.
Although understandably fearful for their own safety, it appears the bear was more concerned with the confectionary fare on offer as it proceeded to devour all the cupcakes before casually walking out the back door of the residence, which is situated along a mountainside overlooking the town of Juneau.
Unfortunately for the bear, it proved to be a fatal final indulgence as it was immediately hunted down and destroyed by local police officers.
The incident marks the latest in a series of bizarre occurrences involving bears in the region, after another Juneau resident managed to ward off the approaches of a black bear by punching it in the snout after it attempted to attack her pet dachshund in 2011.
There have been five black bear attacks in North America since 2010, but fatal attacks are extremely rare. Indeed, experts estimate that inhabitants of the continent are 45 times more likely to die from a dog attack than an encounter with a black bear, which are considered far less lethal than the larger brown or grizzly bear.
Given the wild indigenous bear population of zero in Ireland, it appears that our cupcakes are safe for the timebeing.