Authorities in Japan are searching for a hunter who went missing on a mountain in Hokkaido near where a brown bear was recently spotted, amid a spate of deadly attacks by the animals that has triggered the declaration of a bear emergency in one town. The hunter was reported missing by a friend on Mt Esan on Tuesday afternoon in the northern island of Hokkaido after he failed to return home. A large brown bear was seen near the road on Saturday. Local authorities declared a month-long brown bear emergency for the town, the first of its kind to be issued, with police, fire fighters and hunters running patrols 24 hours a day. The bear in Fukushima was reported to be about 1.5 metres in length, smaller than the one spotted around Mt.