The just updated the news about the victims.

The two survivors are in stable condition and talking to the hospital staff/press/etc.

The victim was a 17 year old boy.


If you ask me the tiger was a victim too, even though my heart goes out the boy and his family.

On the news here in NYC, they said that the victims may have been provoking the tiger while the zoo was closing up for the night. But they didn't elaborate on what the provokation was or where they got that info so take with a grain of salt.


I hate zoos. And circuses. Even natural history museum creep me out--they're like zoos full of taxidermied animals.

DevotedPuppy said:

This would make it even worse.


Again, I feel for the victims, and even if they were provoking the animals, it doesn't make their deaths less tragic.


But wild animals are not meant to be locked in habitats a fraction of the size of the ones they are in, nor should they have to put up with the noise, and trauma of being "provoked" by humans for their own curiosity/entertainment.

I understand the argument that zoo's protect endangered species, but hell--protect their REAL HABITAT.

Everytime I hear the circus in town being promoted on the radio, it irks me.

And I'm no granola loving hippie. I wear leather shoes damnit!

Aren't tigers supposed to stalk, hunt and kill? Do you agree that if these tigers were allowed to take down their kill in a controlled setting, that the urge to kill out of fear would be suppressed? Was the tiger looking to get through the crowd as a means of escape, or did the tiger target a specific human in order to act out its natural instinct to hunt?

I wonder if the zoo keepers actually think they can completely control animal behavior, and was killing a tiger that isn't afraid to attack humans really an answer to how the tiger can learn to adapt to an urban enviorment.... "If the animals get smart... we have to kill them."

Imago said:

Agreed. The whole situation is tragic.

paintedlady said:

so true..

gemini13 said:

Our zoo, thankfully, sent our elephants to a sanctuary.

They are wearing this out in the news. And the thing is I haven't heard any really new info since I read this here.

eeks..

damn...

uhhh...

soo...

errr...

this is why i hate...nevermind.

so...

at this point no one knows what happened but the police are treating the case as a homicide because experts do not think a tiger could exit it's cage do to provocation. so...maybe we should all wait before we blame humankind or animal confinement.

Sigfreid & Roy must be stopped.

Imago said:

Ohhhhh, you made PETA mad.

Imago said:

This story makes me feel mad, crazy, & sad all the same time.

Mad because those who suffered the most were the least reponsible.

Crazy because, from what I understand, even though the two who survived the attack were victims, they were still issued citations by zoo officials. When asked why,
the officials claimed that the two survivors had violated a major rule of the zoo. "Do not feed the animals".

Sad because, I am most assuredly going to Hell for that last comment.

Illustrator said:

XxAxX said:

Exactly...the animals always suffer for doing what they're supposed to do.

Here's another article;

http://www.optimum.net/Ne...eId=367256

Imago said:

figures

paintedlady said:

The tiger was still mauling one of the victims and turned on the police when they tried to intervene. That's when it was shot, in self defense, not revenge.

uPtoWnNY said:

Maybe, but we don't know exactly how/why that Tiger ended up at the SF Zoo.

I know the Oakland Zoo right across the Bay has two Tigers, but both were rescued from a circus where they were kept in 6' X 8' cages most of the time.

Sowhat said:

I'm sure it was a chaotic scene, and people were afraid for their lives, but they could have used tranquilizer guns or rubber bullets to keep the tiger cornered until the tranquilizers took effect. Those people just had a "kill before anyone else gets hurt kind of attitude", not saying that human lives aren't precious, but what value do we as humans put on those animals that are endangered ? Aren't the zookeepers supposed to be trying to send a message of conservation of life? Or are these zookeepers just out for profit like the circus folk? That's all I'm saying..

paintedlady said:

Again...THE TIGER WAS IN THE PROCESS OF MAULING A PERSON THEN TURNED ON THE POLICE WHEN THEY INTERVENED. While it is unfortunate the Tiger was shot, there was no time to get Tranquilizer guns and rubber bullets. If they had tried to do that, another victim would have been killed along with some police officers.

I seriously doubt the police had a "kill before anyone else gets hurts" attitude going into this situation. But if a Tiger turns on me and I have a gun, I'm going to use the gun to save my life, just like they did.

I heard this morning on the news that the visitor killed was in the zoo after closing hours and they could have been the one who enabled the tiger getting out..... my question is what ever happened to using tranquelizers with dangerous animals or taze it at least.

it's kinda interesting how different the local news vs the national news is with this story.

PEJ said:

Not exactly true....the Zoo stopped letting people in at 5:00 PM. Closing time was 6:00 PM.

There was no time to get tranquelizers and I don't know how effective tazing would have been. Besides to taze something, you have to get pretty close and the Tiger would have killed that person before they could have trigger the tazer.

sosgemini said:

It sure is.

sosgemini said:

how so?

wow, a wild animal being caged attacked someone? talk about peculiar behavior!!1

Imago said:

I wonder is Sos speaking in terms of coverage. Sometimes local news gets lazy and spends time on stories out of state as filler coverage .While , National News hits it and quits it then shoves Iraq causaulties of war down our throat.

Imago said:

Well like the post I responded to above, the National news is reporting that the visitors were in the Zoo AFTER closing hours which is wrong. The Zoo stopped letting people in at 5:00 PM. But closing time was 6:00 PM, which the local news is reporting correctly.

The National news is reporting that the police "hunted" the Tiger when they actually stumbled across it as it was mauling one of the victims.

Sowhat said:

Every zoo has a contingency plan in place in case any animals escape, I'm sure there is some sort of state or federal regulation that all zoos take necessary precautions. I highly doubt that they wouldn't keep nets or tranquilizer guns nearby in some sort of shed or office. If these zookeepers could make the time to call in the police, why couldn't they take the time to get the tranquilizer guns? That is assuming of course that there wasn't someone already holding a tranquilizer gun in the first place. And why is there speculation of the tiger being let out, and taunted? This whole situation is just very sad.