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A Tennessee amusement park employee barely escaped with her life after a bear attacked her while on the job … and the whole thing’s on video, which we got a hold of.
The incident went down at Anakeesta — a theme park in Gatlinburg, Tenessee — Thursday evening and, it all kicked off when a bear walked into a concession stand on the grounds and started raiding the place for snacks … something patrons got a front-row seat to.
While many guests stood around and filmed the ferocious furball nibbling on food, a server clearly didn’t get the memo that there was a bear in the building … ’cause she turned the corner into the shack — and came face-to-face with the creature, only to get lunged at.
Check out the clip obtained by TMZ … the bear rears up and makes contact with the woman who quickly runs away from it — the video doesn’t show how exactly she escapes the creature, but eventually, she gets in the concession stand and locks the door behind her.
Eyewitnesses tell TMZ … managers and staff came to check on the server — and, it seemed she was pretty much fine … although she did appear to be holding her arm in pain. She later walked away with management … and it’s unclear if she got sent to the hospital.
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Unfortunately for the patrons, they couldn’t get away as fast as they may have liked … ’cause we’re told people weren’t allowed to leave with the bear still on the loose.
A patron we spoke to claims management locked huge gates at the exit and held people for roughly 30 minutes before they eventually let them leave. Many people were understandably scared … and, we’re told they received little update from management and staffers.
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Worth noting … Anakeesta brands itself an adventure park fully immersed in nature — more national park than Disneyland, that’s for sure — so, it’s not uncommon for patrons to see wild critters during their visits.
No word on what happened to the bear … we’ve hit cops to see what became of it, and whether it was ultimately captured. We’ve reached out to Anakeesta … so far, no word back.