And We Thought We Were Telling the Truth
Bookworm at Bookworm Room on Dec 26 2007 at 8:49 am | Filed under: U.S. News, What the?
When my kids were little and we took them to the San Francisco Zoo my son would always need reassurance on the way home:
“Are you sure the lions and tigers won’t follow us home?”
“We’re sure. They can’t escape from the zoo. You saw the big moats around their cages, didn’t you?”
“You’re super, dooper sure that a lion won’t come into my bedroom?”
“We promise. It won’t escape.”
While the likelihood of a lion or tiger leaving the zoo and heading across the Golden Gate to our house is still small, it turned out we were so very wrong when we told our little guy the lions and tigers couldn’t escape. One did tonight, with horrific consequences:
One zoo visitor was killed and two injured early this evening in an attack by a Siberian tiger that somehow managed to escape from her enclosed grotto. The horrific mauling witnessed by other zoo patrons came nearly a year to the day after the same tiger almost chewed the arm off one of her zookeepers during a public feeding demonstration.
The zoo will be closed Wednesday out of respect for the unnamed victims, described by authorities as men in their 20s. One of the men was killed outside the grotto where the tigers are kept; the other two men were attacked about 300 yards away at a cafe. The incident happened about 20 minutes after the zoo’s 5 p.m. closing time.
The tiger, named Tatiana, was killed by four police officers who tracked it to a cafe and found it atop one of the victims. A police spokesman said the officers distracted the animal, which turned and approached the officers who opened fire with .40-caliber handguns.
Investigators today plan to comb the San Francisco Zoo to piece together how Tatiana escaped from her grotto, which is surrounded by a 15-foot-wide moat and 20-foot-tall wall, said Bob Jenkins, the zoo’s director of animal care and conservation.
Officials refused to rule out carelessness or criminal activity.
My thoughts go to the families of the victims, both living and dead. And I’ll never again comfortably be able to tell my kids that zoos are completely safe.
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