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Senior eats berries, uses leaves to keep warm in week-long battle to survive Siberian wild

A 75-year-old woman who got lost in the woods was found on the 7th day of searches

KEMEROVO, September 12. /TASS/. A resident of the Kemerovo Region who got lost in the woods was found on the 7th day of searches. The senior citizen, 75, ate berries and draped herself in leaves to stay alive, and even survived an encounter with a bear and a bobcat, the press service of the regional Ministry of Internal Affairs said on Tuesday.

The resident of the village Krasnobrodsky went to the forest with relatives but didn’t get out of the woods on time. After failing to find her themselves, her relatives went to the police that began a round of searches together with the Ministry of Emergency Measures and volunteers. "On the 7th day the exhausted pensioner was discovered in the woods. The woman explained that she had heard the search team and followed the sound," the press service reported.

The woman was taken to one of the hospitals in the town Belovo suffering from malnourishment and hyperthermia.

"She explained how she had survived in the forest: she ate berries and roots, made a kind of a cocoon of dry fern leaves and grass in order not to freeze. The woman made a filter of cloth and a straw to get water. During her forced walk through taiga, the pensioner survived two encounters with a bear and a bobcat. But by a stroke of luck, these animals were not aggressive", the office added.

According to Kemerovo Weather Service, the weather in the region was cold all through this past week. "Night temperatures in the south and in the center of the region (where the pensioner went missing) varied from +2 to 8-10 degrees on some days, the coldest night was on September 7 when the forecast had predicted frost and the temperature in some regions dropped to -4 degrees. In addition, there was some precipitation," the service told TASS.