Whether you park inside or out, it’s always important to lock your car doors. It’s especially important when you’re at Lake Tahoe in California, going by this recent video that shows boisterous bears opening car doors with next to no effort.
A home security camera caught not one, but two bears nosing around a truck and an SUV parked in a Lake Tahoe driveway on the night of April 13. The blue Jeep Grand Cherokee is easily identified, and thanks to the bear opening the back door of the truck, we can see the telltale inner door panel of a Ram 1500. We don’t know what’s inside the pickup, but bear number one (chilling in the bed) takes interest after bear number two (the door opener) growls from the cab and sticks its head outside.
That leads to a wrestling match on the Ram’s quarter panel, which probably left some dents and claw marks behind. Bear one exits to the left as bear two continues rummaging around the bed, eventually jumping out a few minutes later. But the saga doesn’t end there.
The video cuts ahead approximately 15 minutes, where we see one of the bears climbing out of the Ram’s cab for a second time. The outdoor light clicks on, and now we see the truck’s driver front door is open. We have no idea what kind of damage was done inside, but the foraging bear apparently didn’t find a satisfactory meal because it goes straight to the Jeep. Mind you, the SUV’s rear door had been open the whole time, so it’s likely one bear ransacked the interior already. It opens the passenger front door and promptly hops onto the passenger seat. The video abruptly ends with the bear still inside.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen bears open car doors. If people keep leaving vehicles unlocked in the presence of bears, it probably won’t be the last. If you’re lucky, scuff marks and scratches will be the only consequences. Unlucky car owners might come out the next morning to see the bear still inside after accidentally locking the doors.
So please, do yourselves and bears around the world a favor. Lock things up at night, lest you come out to an unwelcome disaster or a hangry 700-pound carnivore looking for dessert.