Louis Downard lived at remote Rock Creek Ranch on the Green River in Desolation Canyon for 17 years and never saw a black bear. But when Downard, 78, returned to the ranch during a river trip this week with his family, he was mauled by a bear while he slept in a cot on the banks of the river.

"It was the first and only bear he has ever seen there. He was pretty excited to see it on Thursday night," said Downard's son Marvin on Friday afternoon. That was before the bear returned at 12:30 a.m., when the family awoke to Downard hollering "The bear has got me! Help!"

Downard's daughter, Becky Harvey, of Tooele, was on a cot in the open air next to her father.

"She jumped up and smacked it a couple of times and then my nephew Riley Downard ran up and grabbed the bear and kind of threw it away from my dad," Marvin Downard said.

Riley Downard shot the bear with a .45-caliber handgun once it was a safe distance from the family. The Downards didn't think it was a good idea to follow the bear into the darkness, so they returned to Louis Downard.

"He had a bite just above his belt on his left side and a big ol' bite mark under his left arm on the tricep and a claw mark on his right side. The guides had a big first aid kit, and they had him taken care of very quickly," Marvin Downard said.

Not knowing that the bear had traveled only about 150 feet before dying, the family gathered around a big fire to wait out the night.

"[Louis] was scared at first, but once he realized he would probably be OK he was the calmest one there," said Marvin Downard. "We stayed up just telling [the story] over and over."

Louis Downard was evacuated from Desolation Canyon at about 4 a.m. Friday and flown by helicopter to Utah Valley Regional Medical Hospital in Provo. He was released at around 8 a.m. after the wounds were cleaned and stitched. He also got a shot to prevent rabies in case the bear is found to have the disease.

Marvin Downard said the bear looked healthy when he first got a good look at the animal at around 7:45 p.m. Thursday. The group had seen signs of a bear when they set up for the night and it walked right into camp.

"He got about 20 feet away and hung around for about an hour. He went to the river and got a drink and then came back," Marvin Downard said.

The group eventually banged pots and pans and fired a gun into the air, finally prompting the animal to scamper off.

According to Marvin Downard, the group cleaned up the camp and placed all their food in a raft, so if the bear returned, it would go to the river. Around 9:30 or 10 p.m., they started to crawl into their sleeping bags, hoping the animal was gone for good.

Bear sightings, encounters and even maulings are nothing new on the Desolation Canyon stretch of the Green River. Two men in separate camps were bitten on the same night in May 2004 and another man, also sleeping, was mauled in July 2003. All survived the encounters; all of the bears were subsequently killed.

Utah wildlife officials can only estimate how many bears are in Utah, although their numbers don't appear to have changed dramatically in recent years. But the number of reported human-bear encounters is up this year from last year. Since July, seven bears have been killed by outdoorsmen, including this case.

Utah's only recorded bear fatality was 11-year-old Samuel Ives, who was attacked while in his sleeping bag in American Fork Canyon in June 2007.

The Downards had arranged a river trip to Rock Creek Ranch through Salt Lake-based Colorado River & Trail Expeditions. Hours after the family launched their rafts, Colorado River's Vicki Mackay got a call from the Bureau of Land Management to let her know that a lone boater had reported an encounter with an aggressive bear at Rock Creek earlier in the week.

It was too late to reach her husband, who was guiding the trip.

Brad Crompton, a wildlife biologist for the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, said he also heard reports on Thursday from rafters coming out of Desolation Canyon about a bear at Rock Creek.

"That country is very good bear habitat, but at this time of year when things start to dry up they drop down to lower elevations and encounter people camping along the river," Crompton said. "It is a credit to river runners that there are not more incidents."

While he was resting at his daughter's home in Clinton, Louis Downard was sore and tired from his encounter earlier Friday.

"My dad can tell you some crazy stories about the outlaws who visited the ranch when he lived there," Marvin Downard said. "Now he has one of his own."

brettp@sltrib.com