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A sad situation
01-03-08 - 11:33 p.m.


Feeling: frustrated

Thinking: This could have been avoided :(


Here is something I read recently, being that it has to do with animal welfare, I had to post it:

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http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080104/us_nm/usa_tiger_dc_1

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The San Francisco Zoo reopened on Thursday, nine days after an escaped 250-pound (113-kg) Siberian tiger killed one visitor and mauled two others before police shot it to death.

Families said they were enjoying their rainy-day visit and only mildly disappointed that the zoo's four remaining tigers were behind locked red doors posted with the sign: "The lions and tigers are not on exhibit until further notice."

A tall fence wrapped in green tarp blocked the road to the big cat grottos. Construction crews were adding nearly 7 feet

of glass to the wall that separates the cats from their admirers.

Several visitors speculated about what might have caused 4-year-old Tatiana the tiger to leap from her grotto on Christmas Day and kill Carlos Sousa, Jr., 17.

"That animal was very upset and did something it wouldn't normally do, so I'm suspicious," said Dessie Sandoval, 58. "It was unfortunate that they had to put that cat down because it was acting instinctively. And that's what draws us here -- to see these wild animals."

The San Francisco Chronicle reported on Thursday that an eyewitness told police she saw several boys taunting the big cats near closing time that day.

Police have also discovered a vodka bottle in the car of Sousa's two mauled companions, brothers Paul Dhaliwal, 19, and Kulbir Dhaliwal, 23, police spokesman Steve Mannina said.

"As the details come out, it looks more and more like there were some instances of taunting or something that caused Tatiana to come out of her cage," said Sam Singer, part of the zoo's newly hired crisis management team. "If taunting occurred on Christmas Day, that would give people a different impression of what happened here."

The zoo has been criticized by the Dhaliwals' attorney, Mark Geragos, for taking more than 30 minutes to call the police emergency number after the brothers reported a tiger was loose.

Geragos has also pointed out that the wall separating Tatiana from the public was built in the 1940s and only 12-1/2 feet (3.8-metres) high, short of the 16 feet urged by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums for modern tiger enclosures.

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Ok, this pisses me off for 3 reasons...

First, I am pissed off at the assholes who were (most likely) drinking and teasing the Tiger. What the hell were they thinking? Ok, I mean, even if the tiger couldn't get to them, that is just fucked up to tease an animal. I feel bad for the families of the victims, but if they hadn't been doing something wrong in the first place, it wouldn't have happened!

2nd, I am mad at the San Francisco Zoo for not building the enclosure to the proper size. That should have been taken care of a long time ago. Yes, those idiots should not have teased the tiger, but unfortunately things like that are going to happen and if the enclosure was built so that the tiger could not get out, then that would have been one more way that this could have been avoided.

Finally, I am angry at the police. I realize they had to act quickly to bring down the tiger and although they probably didn't even have tranquilizer guns, they don't work quickly enough. However, I am angry because first of all, I doubt they even thought to try to just disable it and not kill it. Secondly, I really think more needs to be done to find a non-lethal way to bring down animals as well as humans. Tranquilizers aren't fast enough and yeah, there are stun guns, but the "safety" of those remains in question and you can't really use them on something like an animal that is attacking someone. I know it's not entirely the police people's faults, but I wish there was more research into that kind of thing. I don't know, maybe there is, we just haven't seen that much of it. I hope we do though, because it could potentially avoid many fatalities for both humans and animals.

As I said, however, the reason I stated the police last is because if either the kids hadn't teased the tiger, or the zoo had built the enclosure to todays specifications, then the police wouldn't have even been called.

It's a very sad situation and I feel bad for the tiger, who was only reacting on instinct, because it felt threatened.

That's all for now.

yesterday - tomorrow