From Senate hearings to bear 89: Backpack runs ten times the Post's usual start
The Washington Post's short tribute to the new Fat Bear Week winner, billed for his gentle manner and his very large back end, left the paper's other new videos far behind.
Washington PostStory of Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 55,031 views a day, 10 times a normal first day on this channel (5,291).
Meet Backpack, the winner of Fat Bear Week
A new video on the Washington Post channel usually collects a few thousand views on its first day. "Meet Backpack, the winner of Fat Bear Week" had about 36,000 in eleven hours, putting it on course for roughly ten times that usual start.
That is a change of subject for a channel whose last fast starters, as we reported here, came from Senate hearing rooms. Fat Bear Week comes from Katmai National Park in Alaska, where the public votes for the brown bear that has grown the most before winter. The bears are known by numbers, and this year's winner is 89, Backpack. The Post's description credits his win to a gentle temperament and, in its own words, "so much junk in the trunk."
The paper's other uploads from the same two days include leopards back on South Africa's West Coast after 170 years, hospital dogs in Houston and an adult Lego convention in Denmark. None of them came close to the bear.
The small comment section treats the result as a joke worth extending. One viewer asks what the prize is and suggests entering next year. Another notes that a photo near the end shows last year's winner, Chunk. The longest thread, though, has nothing to do with Alaska: it is a conversation about missing Stephen Colbert, set off by one viewer's remark.
Published on Trari
What viewers say
He’s not fat, he’s big boned.
@assumitySee it on YouTubeWhat’s the prize? I may enter next year. 😊
@60AirflyteSee it on YouTubeI don't envy whoever has to carry that Backpack to school...
@LakibdishmaSee it on YouTube
Public comments from the video's page on YouTube
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- Channel
- Washington Post
- Subscribers
- 2,860,000
- Channel views, pace per day
- 343,278 (on a normal day: 216,261)
- Video published
- September 30, 2026
- Video views so far
- 35,960 (less than a day online)
- Video views, pace per day
- 55,031
The numbers
One bear did what the Post's news clips from the same days did not, and the figures show how far ahead of a normal start he ran.
💡 Test your knowledge
Katmai's brown bears famously catch leaping salmon at which waterfall?
Brooks Falls, on the Brooks River in Katmai National Park, is where the bears fish for sockeye salmon to fatten up for winter.
