I suspect the parents will be disappointed, and that the kid did tease the tiger. Sucks, either way.

I'm betting you're right and the young men did play "here kitty kitty kitty". Maybe I should add a Braindead tag?

Well, the architect of the pen greatly underestimated the jumping power of a tiger (30 foot moat, a tiger can EASILY jump such a distance)
Ahem:

<a href='http://www.plime.com/redir.p?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJ0hYMyYEtc ' class='plime' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><b>flash video</b></a>

Short little run: Tiger reaches at least 12 feet high.

<a href='http://www.plime.com/redir.p? <div style='display:block;width:300px;overflow:hidden;'><a class="plime" href="/redir.p?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dm0NrEBDbeE" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dm0NrEBDbeE</a></div> ' class='plime' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><b>flash video</b></a>

Do not underestimate tigers jumping power.

On further note: I'm sad that person died, and I'm sad that such an magnificent animal had to be killed.

On the oyher end of the spectrum, can you find an animal in a zoo that hasn't been taunted?

once again Darwin takes one of his people.

Yeah, but think about it - if you taunt a giraffe, what's the worst that could happen, you get kicked or licked. Go ahead, taunt the herbivores, but leave the carnivores alone.

I'm not going to down vote, but the article that comes up does not match the headline and synopsis.

Story is about the wall being too low, no mention of the possible taunting.

Hmm, think the link has changed (Either by the poster or MSNBC themselves)

But now my point about tigers jumping abilities is even stronger. 12 feet is EASY for a tiger to reach (As seen with my elephant video)

Giraffes can kick a lion dead with one kick, so don't taunt the herbivores either.

BTW: Here in Holland, we had our own incident with an escaping gorilla this year. He hurt a lady pretty bad.

Exactly why I don't ever taunt animals.

I have a pet cat which can easily jump onto the cupboards in our kitchen which are at a height of about 7 ft. Think about it : little puddy cat - 7ft

Big tiger - as high as he wants pretty much.


Now I do agree that it's sad that somebody died but it's sadder that a Tiger was destroyed for doing what tigers do. I like zoos and will continue to visit them but deep down I can't help feeling that they are wrong.

Regardless of whether the tiger was taunted or not, I think responsibility for this is completely on the zoo. The walls were far too short, and the zoo had to know this, that alone is wrong but what's even worse about it is that this tiger ripped apart a zookeeper's arm last year around this time*. Why wasn't it made completely sure this tiger couldn't harm anyone in the first place, let alone after it had already attacked someone? It's a wild animal.

I can't help but feel that the tiger is just as much a victim as the people who were mauled.

*http://www.kktv.com/home/headlines/12838617.html

If one of the guys in the hospital DID taunt the tiger, he is NOT a victim, he's an example! :)

What really got me was this:

Their names were provided by hospital and law enforcement sources who spoke on condition of anonymity because the family had not yet given permission to release their names.

Good f**king job. Grant them anonymity because they're releasing classified information they don't have permission to release.


I hope the allegation that the men taunted the tiger proves true, though. Social Darwinism > tragedy.

The tiger wasn't destroyed, he was killed while attacking the police officers. So its death was inevitable that way.

Well, technically, Tigers were not built for jumping. Most of their muscle mass is in the front end, which means poor balance.

I guess this specific Tiger believed he/she could fly and soared through the sky!

Or...

A zookeeper who wasn't thinking put a tree or something for the Tiger to climb up and that helped launched Tiger closer to the goal of getting out.

Just taking some guesses...I trained some big cats in my internship, and I've never seen habitats that were too low or had trees and rocks laying near the sides of the habitats. If they were, they usually had the top covered as well.





The world may never know!