Voting for Alaska's Fat Bear Week contest begins after one grizzly kills another on video

Voting began Wednesday for the super-sized grizzly bears in the race to win in 2024 Fat bear week Competition, based on the graphic of an animal Death on camera delayed the event.

Now in its 10th year, Fat Bear Week is an annual competition of sorts that allows viewers around the world to watch a series of live streams featuring several brown bears roaming Katmai National Park and Preserve in southern Alaska. Stretching across the wilderness of the Alaska Peninsula, Katmai is home to some of the region's largest grizzly bears, which come to the Brooks River each year for the seasonal salmon hunt.

As feeding season nears its end and months of hibernation lie ahead, the national park's bulkiest animals are celebrated for their hunting successes during Fat Bear Week. Fans can vote online for the Grizzlies to compete for induction into the competition's Hall of Champions this year, with the most popular bears going through multiple rounds until just one is crowned the winner.

Fat Bear Week began Wednesday and runs through Oct. 8, known as Fat Bear Tuesday, when contest organizers host digital chats about Katmai and the bears themselves. The National Park Service is partnering with nonprofit Explore.org to organize the weeklong event, while the organization streams intimate recordings of participants on its website.

Bears are technically “pitted against each other” because Katmai Park rangers place them in brackets typical of traditional sports tournaments, the park service writes in a description of Fat Bear Week on its website.

“People can vote based on whatever criteria they see fit,” the description reads. “In the end, one person has the upper hand to rule.”

Organizers of the Fat Bear Week 2024 contest postponed the unveiling of their bracket earlier this week after an on-camera fight between two bears at the mouth of the Brooks River resulted in the death of one of the animals. The older female grizzly, known as Bear 402, a former Fat Bear Week participant, was killed by a male named Bear 469 on Monday morning. Mike Fritz, the resident naturalist at Explore.org, and Sarah Bruce, a ranger at Katmai Park, suggested in an online discussion in lieu of revealing that the male had apparently drowned the “beloved” female, although they weren't sure , why the fight started.

“National parks like Katmai protect not only the wonders of nature, but also harsh realities,” Matt Johnson of the National Park Service said in a statement to CBS News after Bear 402 was killed. “Every bear seen on the webcams is competing with others for survival.”

This year's group consists of 11 giant grizzly bears. The lineup was finally revealed on Tuesday evening.