Grizzly bear smashes Minnesota Zoo partition with massive rock

A grizzly bear at the Minnesota Zoo in Apple Valley grabbed a large rock with both paws and shattered one layer of a five-layer panel of glass as onlookers stared from the outside on Monday morning.

Luckily, no one was hurt on either side of the barrier as the bear repeatedly hit the glass with the rock. Zoo animal collections manager Tony Fisher believes it was Kenai, a nearly full-grown male bear, who broke the glass as a form of playing.

“It [the glass] did what it was supposed to do," Fisher said. "The public was never in any danger. Not trying to get out. He was just playing with a rock."

The glass, which is two-and-a-half inches thick, and five layers, is now its own attraction at the Zoo.

Robin Ficker, a Washington D.C.-area defense attorney and famous sports heckler was there to see the whole incident go down.

“All of a sudden, while they were wrestling and playing, one of them picked up a very large rock," Ficker said. "It had to weigh 50 pounds, and did a chest pass with that rock just like Wes Unseld used to do with the basketball into the glass."

Ficker, who made a name for himself poking the bear in sports arenas around the country, knew this bear might be out of his heckling league.

“You're talking the size of four big Minnesotan Vikings linemen in one bear,” he said.

The bear, along with two other grizzles, are part of an open-air exhibit. The exhibit will be closed until a temporary partition can be installed before a new pane is put in, which will cost tens of thousands of dollars.