Stupid Italian Women Rescued from ‘Wolves’

Italian media went a little bit berserk last week when two hikers in South Tyrol called for help. The 23-year-old women had encountered a pack of seven or eight creatures approaching them “threateningly” before moving away and watching them from a distance.

A rescue helicopter airlifted the pair to safety, unharmed but frightened. A forest ranger on the scene was baffled about the rescue call since there are no wolves in the area (and only about 3300 in all of Italy). An inspection of tracks in the area – at approximately 8600-foot elevation – showed the menacing creatures were not wolves at all but a much more benign animal, the chamois.

Before the positive identification, some news outlets ran with the sexier wolf story. The German-language daily newspaper in South Tyrol Dolomiten blared out a scary front-page headline: Beim Wandern von Wolfsrudel umkreist: Retter aus der Luft befreien 2 Frauen (“Surrounded by packs of wolves while hiking: Two women rescued by air”). The accompanying photo was of snarling, fang-bearing wolves.

Oops. This dumb story of mistaken identity is especially funny because the Italian wolf and the chamois do not look remotely similar. The website ExplorersWeb issued a handy Field Guide – images of the animals side by side. One is described as “wolf-shaped” while the other is “100 percent not wolf-shaped.”

The panic comes at a delicate time as conservationists are hoping to build up the wolf population in the Italian alps, but some humans remain wary of the predators. Centuries of bad press will do that to a species, but the fact is, the odds of a wolf even approaching a human in the wild is exceedingly low. For the most part they are as harmless as chamois.

Photo credit: ExplorersWeb / Shutterstock