Bear sighted at Tokyo Olympics baseball stadium before opening event

Beary scary.

Low Jia Ying | July 23, 2021, 01:00 PM

The softball match on Wednesday, July 21, was the opening event of the Tokyo Olympics.

But hours before the event was to begin, a bear alert was put out.

Japanese media reported that guards saw the bear at the Fukushima Azuma Baseball Stadium early on Wednesday before the match was set to take place, according to AP News.

Loud music and firecrackers to lure bear out

Japan Times reported that a Fukushima police spokesperson confirmed that the bear was first spotted the night before.

Olympic guards were deployed to search for the bear on the night before the match, using loud music and firecrackers to lure to bear out, to no avail, according to Sports Hochi.

A police spokesperson also told media that they were "on alert" even though there are no spectators in the stadium.

The bear in question is believed to be around 3ft long (around 1m).

Some sources have identified the bear as an Asian black bear, while others speculate that the bear was an Ussuri brown bear — both of which are common in Japan.

Match carried on

The sighting, however, did not seem to unnerve the Japanese team too much, who defeated Australia 8-1.

Members of the women's U.S. softball team told AP News that they were spooked by news of the bear, with one calling it "crazy" that a "big black bear" is "on the loose".

No further sightings of the bear were reported on Wednesday or Thursday.

The Tokyo Olympics has experienced its fair share of obstacles, from calls for it to be postponed given the spike in Covid-19 cases in Tokyo, to the first Covid-19 case reported within the Olympics Village on July 17.

Top photo via Google Maps/さいとう建 and Unsplash.