After a week of fierce competition, Bear 910 and Backpack have emerged as the final contenders to be named the heftiest bear of Alaska's Katmai National Park and Preserve.
There can only be one winner of Fat Bear Week, and it's up to the voters to decide Tuesday.
The contest, which is in its 12th year, celebrates the resilience of the 2,200 brown bears that live in the preserve on the Alaska Peninsula, which extends from the state’s southwest corner toward the Aleutian Islands. Fat Bear Week was started in 2014 as an interactive way to inform the public about brown bears, the coastal cousins of grizzlies.
Last year’s winner, Chunk — known officially as Bear 32 — clinched his victory at an estimated 1,200 pounds. He was handily defeated in the first round of competition this year by Bucky, who went on to lose a faceoff against Backpack, known officially as Bear 89.
The event this year featured 16 bears vying for the heavyweight title in a single-elimination, bracket-style tournament. All voting is done online at www.fatbearweek.org, and a winner will be declared Tuesday evening after the final poll closes. The public can watch the bears on explore.org’s livestream cameras before deciding on their favorite.
“Fat bears are successful bears,” the nonprofit says on its website. This group gorges itself on the abundant salmon that return to the Brooks River starting in late June. It's there that they can stuff themselves to accumulate the fat reserves they'll need to survive the winter. To be featured in the contest, the bears must frequent the area around the river.
Adult male brown bears typically weigh 600 to 900 pounds (about 270 to 410 kilograms) in midsummer. By the time they are ready to hibernate after feasting on migrating and spawning salmon, large males can weigh well over 1,000 pounds (454 kilograms). Females are about one-third smaller. The bears may each eat as many as 30 fish a day this time of year, working hard to eat a year’s worth of food in about six months.
During winter hibernation, the bears do not eat or drink and lose one-third of their body weight.
Fat Bear Week's contestants also include five bear families, in recognition of the record high number of families and cubs at the river this summer. A mother must feed and protect her cubs while also eating enough calories to sustain herself through hibernation. Cubs often face the risk of attack by other bears due to territorialism or food scarcity.
Bear 132 and her three spring cubs advanced to the semifinals, but lost out to Bear 910.
Jamie Stengle contributed from Dallas.
This Sept. 9, 2026 photo provided by the National Park Service shows Bear 910 standing along the Brooks River in Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska. (C. Loberg/National Park Service via AP)
PLYMOUTH, Mass. (AP) — Lindsay Clancy's lawyer argued Tuesday that there wasn’t enough evidence to prove she killed her three children, a striking turn after a lengthy trial that focused more on her mental state than on whether she took their lives.
“This entire case is based on speculation,” attorney Kevin Reddington said during the first hearing since Clancy's trial ended Sept. 4 with a deadlocked jury. They were split 11 to 1 in her favor.
During that trial, Reddington didn't dispute that Clancy killed the children at the family's home in 2023. Instead, the defense sought to persuade the jury that the 36-year-old former labor and delivery nurse was not criminally responsible because of mental disease, a rare condition called postpartum psychosis.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, the national suicide and crisis lifeline in the U.S. is available by calling or texting 988.
But at Tuesday's hearing, Reddington sought to persuade Judge William Sullivan — the same judge who presided over the first trial — to acquit Clancy.
There is, Reddington contended, not enough evidence “that this woman killed those children.” He pointed to matters ranging from her condition when she was found, badly injured and bleeding in the yard outside her home, to her lack of memory of what happened when she woke up in a hospital. At the first trial, her now ex-husband and first responders testified that they arrived at the house and discovered she had tried to kill herself right after killing the children.
“Where is the admission? Where does she say that she did this?” Reddington asked, going on to recap his arguments that she also was psychotic and delusional at the time of the children's deaths. He didn’t offer any alternative theories or evidence about who might be responsible.
Prosecutor Shanan Buckingham called his argument “laughable,” pointing to various evidence raised during the trial. In court papers filed Monday, prosecutors recapped their arguments that there was enough evidence to convict Clancy.
The prosecution maintains that Clancy knew her actions were wrong when she used exercise bands to strangle 5-year-old Cora, 3-year-old Dawson and 8-month-old Callan Clancy. They said she contrived to get her husband out of the house that evening by sending him to pick up medicine for one of their children and dinner for the family.
The judge didn’t immediately decide, and no trial date was set.
Prosecutors have yet to decide whether to retry Clancy, Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy Cruz said after the hearing. They could choose to retry her on first-degree murder charges or seek to try her only on lesser charges, including second-degree murder or manslaughter, or drop the case entirely.
“We are going to do what we can for the children,” Cruz told reporters outside the court. “That is what this case is about.”
Clancy's attorneys have also asked the judge to dismiss the criminal case. Among other things, they have argued that the judge should have ousted the one juror who favored a murder conviction after the jury foreperson complained he was refusing to listen to the law on reasonable doubt.
The juror, Michael Desronvil, has said through his lawyer that he had no doubts about his stance. Desronvil told Fox News’ “Hannity” in a brief video statement on Monday that “the whole focus has been on me, but we want to reel everything back and put the focus on the three angels,” meaning the children.
The livestreamed trial generated intense public interest and drew attention to maternal mental health after childbirth. About a dozen Clancy supporters, most dressed in pink, stood outside court Tuesday waiting for her to arrive.
Clancy remains charged with murder and is expected to stay at a psychiatric hospital until her case is resolved.
Clancy could have been sentenced to life in prison if convicted of murder. If acquitted, the judge could have ordered her confined to a mental health facility.
Peltz reported from New York.
Lindsay Clancy's father Michael Musgrove listens to the motions hearing in his daughter's triple murder trial, Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2026, at Plymouth Superior Court in Plymouth, Mass. (Greg Derr/The Patriot Ledger via AP, Pool)
Judge William Sullivan listens to an argument by Kevin Reddington on a motion to dismiss the case as the Lindsay Clancy murder trial continues, Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2026, during a hearing set to determine the next steps after a mistrial was declared on Sept. 4th, in Plymouth, Mass. (Greg Derr/The Patriot Ledger via AP, Pool)
Attorney Kevin Reddington listens during a hearing set to determine the next steps after a mistrial was declared on Sept. 4th, in Plymouth, Mass. on Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2026. (Greg Derr/The Patriot Ledger via AP, Pool)
Lindsay Clancy sits in Plymouth Superior Court, Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2026, during a hearing set to determine the next steps after a mistrial was declared on Sept. 4th, in Plymouth, Mass. (Greg Derr/The Patriot Ledger via AP, Pool)
Defendant Lindsay Clancy listens to a motion in court while seated next to her attorney Kevin Reddington, Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2026, during a hearing set to determine the next steps after a mistrial was declared on Sept. 4th, in Plymouth, Mass. (Greg Derr/The Patriot Ledger via AP, Pool)
