BLOOMFIELD, Conn. (WTNH) — A bear ripped through a screen on a back door to break into a home Wednesday in Bloomfield, terrifying the residents inside.

“I woke up and my brother-in-law told me that there’s a bear in the house,” one of the home’s residents, who asked not to be identified, told News 8.

The break broke in at about 5 p.m. on Maple Edge Drive.

The resident said he stayed upstairs with his brother-in-law and called police.

“Please, don’t come upstairs,” he recalled thinking to himself. “I’m thinking about going through the window if it tried to come upstairs.”

He told News 8 the bear was inside for about 15 minutes. The two were able to run outside — and that’s when they saw the bear’s yearlings. 

The bear also left the house on its own. The Department of Energy and Environmental Protection’s EnCon Police responded and subsequently euthanized the bear.

“I’m very disturbed to hear that the bear had to be euthanized,” said David Sasportas, of Bloomfield.

News 8 spoke with DEEP to find out why the decision was made.

“Once bears have gotten comfortable enough to break into a house, it means that it’s highly unlikely that anything we do to try and train that bear — any conditioning we might do — probably not going to be effective at this point,” said Jenny Dickson, the director of wildlife at DEEP.

Shesaid there’s a good chance this bear would do it again, posing a risk to public safety.

“We’ve had some bears sort of gone on little sprees of breaking into five, six, seven houses,” Dickson said. “It is the kind of thing where if they start doing it, they unfortunately keep doing this.”

As for the yearlings, Dickson said they’re fine on their own.

“At this point, they’re already a year old, they know what to do, they’re fully grown, this is right around the time of year that the female bear would have been saying yeah, it’s time for you to find your own spot anyway,” Dickson said.

She recommends taking bird feeders down, putting garbage out on collection day, and to be diligent about cleaning backyard grills to deter this type of behavior.

Home entries involving bears are on the rise in Connecticut, with a record 67 incidents reported in 2022. That’s a sharp contrast compared to just seven years ago, when we averaged less than 10 home entries annually. 

People who live in the Bloomfield neighborhood, said they’re going to be more careful.

“You have to be more aware, you know?” said Fennell Hayles, of Bloomfield. “You can’t be too afraid, but be more conscious of the situation.”