A seasonal mechanic driving through Yellowstone National Park stopped his pickup truck to avoid hitting a bison – only for the bison to hit him anyway.
Kyle Weber was heading home after a summer working for Yellowstone Park Service Stations. On Thursday morning, he left Canyon Village in his old Ford Ranger and drove south toward Fishing Bridge.
At 2:45 a.m., Weber encountered a bull bison on the road near Mud Volcano.
“I was going through the trees, coming around the corner, and I saw a bison on the road,” he told Cowboy State Daily. “I slammed on my brakes and stopped and was just sitting there watching and waiting for him to continue walking.”
At first, the bull bison seemed unbothered, he said. He seemed to ignore the vehicle as Weber waited for him to move on.
Suddenly, the bison ran toward Weber’s truck and slammed its massive head into the left side.
“I definitely got jolted in that thing,” he said. “I knew they hit hard, but that was pretty rough. It pushed my truck back at least a foot and a half.”
It was a hit-and-run. Once he bashed the front of the truck, the bison turned tail and ran off without exchanging information.
The bison bash dented the truck’s bumper, broke the side marker light, and left a sizeable dent in the hood.
Weber’s dashcam captured the entire incident.
“My wheel scrapes against the bumper when I do sharp turns, but the headlight and everything else works fine,” Weber said. “Not as bad as it could have been, but still not great.”
Road Hazards
The speed limit throughout most of Yellowstone is 45 mph, but the park encourages drivers to go slower in many sections. It’s especially important at night when the forest-lined corridors are nearly pitch black and full of bison.
Bison jams commonly cause traffic congestion in the park. There are safe, acceptable ways to pass them, but most people stop to take photos or avoid provoking the massive animals into damaging their vehicles.
Stephen Borgmier, Weber’s co-worker, expects to encounter bison on the road, especially at night. It’s more inevitable than occasional in Yellowstone.
“My wife and I were driving out of Fishing Bridge about three weeks ago in the dark,” he said. “A bison came up on the road and stopped, then two or three more came right up in front of us.”
One of the bison, a bull, stopped moving as soon as it came within the vehicle’s headlights. Borgmier said that as soon as his wife dimmed the lights, the bull started moving again.
He said he believes that might explain what happened to his friend on Thursday morning, at least partially.
“He seemed blinded by the headlights,” he said. “I don’t know, but maybe the headlights are what aggravated the bison into charging.”
Bison are dangerous at night because their dark hides make them difficult to see, especially around curves.
Also, bison eyes don’t reflect in headlights the same way deer and elk do because they lack a reflective layer in the back of their eyes.
A bison was fatally struck by a vehicle in Yellowstone on Thursday night, less than 24 hours after what happened to Weber.
Slower Traffic Use Pullout
After the bison hit-and-run, Weber kept driving and found the same bison that bashed him farther ahead.
“Unfortunately, he went the same direction I was going,” he said. “I wanted to make sure I followed directly behind him as far back as I could, where I could still see him with my headlights.”
Weber’s relief came in the form of a pullout. When the bison wandered off the road and onto the pullout, Weber overtook him while giving him a wide berth.
“I sped past him to make sure he wouldn't come back out again in front of or to the side of me,” he said. “So that was fun.”
Weber considered what he might have done differently to avoid getting his bison bashing his truck. In hindsight, he couldn’t think of anything that would've worked.
“They usually continue on their way,” he said. “I could have backed up, maybe backed off him a bit, but I didn't know if moving would agitate him. He looked agitated when I pulled up, so I thought sitting still was my best option. And it might have been. Who knows?
Borgmier just finished his ninth season with Yellowstone Park Service Stations, managing the Fishing Bridge station.
“We work on tourist cars and RVs that have problems while they’re in the park,” he said. “I’m retired, but most of our mechanics are in school. They come here to work during their summer break and go back to school during the winter.”
Because most of Borgmier’s mechanics are college kids, they’re just trying to scrape by with what they make during the summer. Deliberate bison damage could strain anyone’s budget, but even a mechanic might struggle to cover the costs.
To Borgmier's surprise, the damage to Weber’s Ranger was mostly superficial. It’ll probably buff right out, but even with the video, Borgmier doesn’t think Weber will be filing an insurance claim.
The damage to the Chevy S-10 was mostly superficial. It’ll probably buff right out, but even with the video, Borgmier doesn’t think the driver will be filing a claim.
“He’s just out of school, so I doubt he has anything but liability,” he said.
Instead, both men hope the video will remind people who owns Yellowstone’s roads.
“We’re hoping it would help somebody else avoid the same situation in the future,” Borgmier said. “Bison do own the roads in Yellowstone, and he found out the hard way.”
Cool Little Keepsake
Weber, who graduated from a technical school in the spring, doesn’t plan to go through insurance. He intends to fix the damage himself.
“I'm definitely going to be replacing the bumper and side marker at some point,” he said. “I already had some upgrades in mind, so I guess now is a good time for me to put those in.”
The easiest thing to repair, the dented hood, is the one thing Weber thinks he’ll keep as is. Not everyone can say they have bison damage decorating their vehicle.
“I think I’ll keep it,” he said. “It has a cool story behind it, and after a fantastic summer, where I met so many people and saw so many amazing things, it’s a cool little keepsake.”
Contact Andrew Rossi at arossi@cowboystatedaily.com
Andrew Rossi can be reached at arossi@cowboystatedaily.com.
