Courtesy photo given to the Billings Gazette

Steve Kintner wanted to kill an elk all of his life. With hospice already called in, it didn’t look like the 62-year-old was going to fulfill his big-game dream — until a special hunting opportunity in his home state allowed him to leave his deathbed and charge out after bugling elk.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife has several provisions in place for disabled hunters and anglers, including special permits that can be granted to sportsmen with nine months or less to live. The permit allows them one last chance at the outdoors, unofficially dubbed the “end-of-life hunt.” According to the Billings Gazette, between three and 15 hunters have used the allowance each year since its adoption 10 years ago.

Kintner certainly qualified. He has stage 4 cancer and barely has the strength to do regular activities, much less go after elk. A tumor first showed up on his liver in 2001; he underwent numerous surgeries, with the cancer returning seven times. He finally chose to stop taking treatments due to their weakening and sickening effects. In November, 2014, the cancer metastasized to his right lung. By the summer of 2015 it was in the left one as well.

The Army veteran and former logging truck driver had taught himself computers earlier in life, leading to a job at Microsoft in the 1990s. Refusing to lay down and die, he began searching for potential hunting opportunities. Computer savvy as he is, Kintner found the special permit details online.

“I was looking for opportunities for disabled hunters on the web when I stumbled onto the permits for the terminally ill,” he told the Billings Gazette. “You have to dig for it, but it’s there.”

He was so feeble his doctor had to fill out the paperwork.

The wildlife department’s Americans with Disabilities Act program manager, Dolores Noyes, worked with Kintner’s physicians to arrange the hunt. Normally family members help the ill hunter go afield, but Kintner’s family reportedly didn’t have the skills required to help. Instead, Art Meikel of the Inland Northwest Wildlife Council volunteered to assist him.

Several landowners offerred their properties as possible locations, but Meikel ultimately decided on Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge for Kintner’s hunt. He had to be brought in via vehicle, but his hunt fell during the closed period between archery and muzzleloader season. Kintner had the place to himself. 

“My oncologist at the VA didn’t want me to go — he said I might die. That’s a pretty funny thing to say to a terminally ill patient,” Kintner said. “What better place to die than on an elk hunt?”

Kintner was 12 when he first went hunting, also for elk. He didn’t see any that trip — or any subsequent hunting trip. For 50 years he had dreamed of bugling bulls, but now he was on the ground, searching one last time for a chance at success. With his any-elk/any-time/any-weapon tag and oxygen bottle in hand, he was off.

This time he saw plenty of elk. He eventually ventured a shot, but it was a clean miss. Day One ended with Kintner exhausted and not mentally or physically up for Day Two. Meikel would have none of it, and the next morning they were back in the truck. They spooked one elk before dawn, but during shooting light a spike made its appearance. 

Kintner rested his .300 Winchester Magnum across the hood of the truck and shot twice. The elk was his.

Despite his best efforts, Kintner couldn’t help much with the cleaning. He helped pour coffee for his helpers, resting from the effort and the thrill.

The elk was processed, with Kintner’s family having elk meat for the first time. He also took home the heart, a traditional feast he has enjoyed from deer he has previously killed.

In the end, he credited the amazing group of volunteers with helping him check elk off his bucket list. He called it “the hunt of a lifetime.”

“I have more appreciation for what they did before and after the shot than I can express in words. Pulling the trigger is secondary. I’m just a guy in the process of dying.”