ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — A veteran musher had to kill a moose after it injured his dog shortly after the start of this year’s Iditarod, race officials said Monday.
Dallas Seavey informed the officials with the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race early Monday morning that he was forced to shoot the moose with a handgun in self-defense.
This came “after the moose became entangled with the dogs and the musher,” a statement from the race said.
Seavey, who is tied for the most Iditarod wins ever at five, said he urged officials to get the moose off the trail.
“It fell on my sled, it was sprawled on the trail,” Seavey told an Iditarod Insider television crew. “I gutted it the best I could, but it was ugly.”
Seavey, who turned 37 years old on Monday, is not the first musher to have to kill a moose during an Iditarod. In 1985, the late Susan Butcher was leading the race when she used her axe and a parka to fend off a moose, but it killed two of her dogs and injured 13 others. Another musher came along and killed the moose.
This year’s race started Sunday afternoon in Willow, about 75 miles (121 kilometers) north of Anchorage. Seavey encountered the moose just before 2 a.m. Monday, 14 miles (22 kilometers) outside the race checkpoint in Skwentna, en route to the next checkpoint 50 miles (80 kilometers) away in Finger Lake.
Seavey arrived in Finger Lake later Monday, where he dropped a dog that was injured in the moose encounter. The dog was flown to Anchorage, where it was being evaluated by a veterinarian.
Alaska State Troopers were informed of the dead moose, and race officials said every effort was being made to salvage the meat.
Race rules state that if a big game animal like a moose, caribou or buffalo is killed in defense of life or property, the musher must gut the animal and report it to race officials at the next checkpoint. Mushers who follow must help gut the animal when possible, the rules states.
The 1,000-mile (1,609-kilometer) race across Alaska will end sometime next week when the winning musher comes off the Bering Sea ice and crosses under the burled arch finish line in Nome.
Obey
Article URL : https://apnews.com/article/iditarod-alaska-seavey-kills-moose-sled-dog-13c5e674d5062375bb0881d3ccb5e919