4 yr old falls into gorilla enclosure at zoo

[JW55]

In the video that has come out it shows the gorilla holding on to the child and appears to be bathing it… This would seem similar behavior to an incident that happened a few years ago at another zoo. Other comments were that he dragged the child and threw it against the wall. The video is like 2 1/2 minutes and the child was in there considerably longer, so hard to say what else might have happened for sure. Seemed to have been plenty of time to traquilize the animal if they wanted to. Of course if there was imminent danger, the animal would have to be killed.

 

[OraLabora]

Sadly, there are some online commenters who felt the child should have died to save the gorilla. I don’t understand how someone can think that animal life supercedes human life in priority. :nope:

Agreed.

The human life v’s gorilla life question is one thing, the irresponsibility of the child’s mother quite another.

There but for the grace of God go I. My wife and I having raised 3 boys past the age of 4 (all three young adults now), I can say that a 4 y.o. can quickly outwit even the most alert parent, especially if the parent has to divide his or her attention across more than one child. I would instead point the finger at an enclosure that was not child proof. We’ve had the odd scare with our own kids. Fortunately nothing serious ever happened other than some sports injuries.

 

[utah_rose]

Well then, the zoo should have anticipated such an emergency and made it physically impossible for a child to fall in there and necessitate the killing of the animal.

ICXC NIKA

I feel sorry both for the little boy and the gorilla. Many years ago at the Cleveland Zoo gorillas were enclosed in a cavern surrounded by a fence. An aspiring artist climbed the fence to sit astride it to paint it’s picture and fell to his death, and got murdered by the gorilla. Signs of course warning you to stay away from the fence were there and ignored. And he was an adult, not a little boy who probably just got too close. Sadly enough though, I bet that family will sue the zoo and there won’t be any more gorillas there. The Cleveland incident took place during the 50s and suing was rare.

 

[boomerang]

Well then, the zoo should have anticipated such an emergency and made it physically impossible for a child to fall in there and necessitate the killing of the animal.

ICXC NIKA

Bingo!

 

[CradleJourney]

Well then, the zoo should have anticipated such an emergency and made it physically impossible for a child to fall in there and necessitate the killing of the animal.

ICXC NIKA

Zoos do their best to make it impossible for people to get in and animals to get out - however, both can and do happen. I had an adventurous 4yr old and it was amazing the places he could get into. Which is exactly why at a place like a zoo, I was on top of him every moment.

Kids and animals are both escape artists.

It’s tragic the boy was hurt. It’s tragic the animal had to be killed. It’s tragic for the parent who has the responsibility for both events on their shoulders.

Fix that access point. Use this to educate visitors and move on.

 

[CatholicSheila]

The safety measures surrounding the gorilla we’re NOT child proof.

I read the park has been there for 38 years and this has never happened. I bet a lot of kids have gone through in that time. The mother was doing something wrong if her child was able to get into the enclosure.

I won’t comment on killing the gorilla. If it was genuinely a risk to the child then I agree that the child comes first however I have read conflicting reports on whether it was indeed a risk. Simply been bigger than the child doesn’t show a risk. In fact, it may be the opposite. If the gorilla recognized the child as just that, he may have simply taken care of him. Apparently there have been other cases where gorillas have tended to children in their enclosures. One in 1986 in Jersey involved a male gorilla who cared for a child that fell into his enclosure and was injured.

 

[dixieagle]

Gorillas are physically larger than human beings, and have several times the muscular strength of a human being.

So even if it were only “tossing the kid around,” that could easily lead in seconds to a dead child.

Tranquilizing the animal might have taken too long. Killing was the way to go.

No doubt the zoo was loath to eliminate a valuable animal; but having a dead child at its foot would have been infinitely worse. They made the right call.

ICXC NIKA

Of course they did. That we even have to discuss this is indicative of how skewed our priorities have become.

That said, I simply cannot imagine letting my small child out of my grasp when there is even the slightest possibility that something like this could happen. I also imagine we’ll see some changes in this particular gorilla enclosure made by the Cincinnati Zoo.

 

[7_Sorrows]

Of course they did. That we even have to discuss this is indicative of how skewed our priorities have become.

That said, I simply cannot imagine letting my small child out of my grasp when there is even the slightest possibility that something like this could happen. I also imagine we’ll see some changes in this particular gorilla enclosure made by the Cincinnati Zoo.

I remember taking my 4 year old son to the Grand Canyon. He might have been 3 1/2, but he was fast and had lots of energy. I didn’t take my eyes off of him for a minute and probably never stopped with the warnings - slow down! don’t get close to the edge! no climbing!
when you have a child that age-they can get into trouble quickly.
thank goodness this little boy was not killed. I am sure he learned his lesson! we will never know what the gorilla was thinking. he was not human. sadly, this ended in his death and, hopefully the zoo will do something to prevent anything like this happening again.

 

[Kaninchen]

There but for the grace of God go I. My wife and I having raised 3 boys past the age of 4 (all three young adults now), I can say that a 4 y.o. can quickly outwit even the most alert parent, especially if the parent has to divide his or her attention across more than one child. I would instead point the finger at an enclosure that was not child proof. We’ve had the odd scare with our own kids. Fortunately nothing serious ever happened other than some sports injuries.

Sorry but no, there are few places entirely safe for an unattended 4 year old and taking several young children to a Zoo - with myriad opportunities for attraction, distraction, annoying one another, getting tired, getting hot, foot stamping and running off and generally ‘getting up to no good’ - and leaving a 4 year old to his own devices there is irresponsible.

If it had not been an animal so we could get distracted by the life of a gorilla v’s life of a child but had been a china shop and the child had destroyed valuable property, I wonder what we’d be saying about her actions/inactions.

 

[_Abyssinia]

Are there no tranquilisers in existence that could have as quickly sedated the animal as a gunshot could?

 

[Memaw]

Well then, the zoo should have anticipated such an emergency and made it physically impossible for a child to fall in there and necessitate the killing of the animal.

ICXC NIKA

I agree, it evidently was NOT child proof or the little boy could not have fallen in there in the first place. The responsibility lies with the Zoo. They did the right thing in saving the child no matter how “valuable” the gorilla was, or what their “plans” for him were. Sad to say to many people put animals above humans in so many ways. We have to pay to kill our babies, (abortion), but have huge fines or even jail for destroying an unborn Eagle egg. As well as other so called endangered species. God Help us. God Bless, Memaw

 

[aicirt]

Are there no tranquilisers in existence that could have as quickly sedated the animal as a gunshot could?

Guy from a zoo was on this AM and stated that a tranquilizer would have taken 10 minutes to knock the gorilla out. After being stung, he could have gotten very angry and killed the child. He also pointed out that this was a male which is capable of crushing a coconut in his hand. Picture the child’s head.

 

[LaetenturCaeli]

If it had not been an animal so we could get distracted by the life of a gorilla v’s life of a child but had been a china shop and the child had destroyed valuable property, I wonder what we’d be saying about her actions/inactions.

Do we know for a fact what the mother was doing at the time the child fell into the enclosure?

 

[OraLabora]

Sorry but no, there are few places entirely safe for an unattended 4 year old and taking several young children to a Zoo - with myriad opportunities for attraction, distraction, annoying one another, getting tired, getting hot, foot stamping and running off and generally ‘getting up to no good’ - and leaving a 4 year old to his own devices there is irresponsible.

If it had not been an animal so we could get distracted by the life of a gorilla v’s life of a child but had been a china shop and the child had destroyed valuable property, I wonder what we’d be saying about her actions/inactions.

It only takes a few seconds distraction, even for the ablest and best-intentioned parent. We are, after all, only human.

There was a recent incident in Montreal at a busy park on a national holiday; a family was gathered for a BBQ, and a man snatched a child from the family, while someone looked away for only an instant. Fortunately the father of the child realized what happened, took off after the kidnapper, restrained him, and beat him. Then the rest of the men in the area surrounded the kidnapper until the police arrived. The father said it took all he had to avoid killing the man.

I don’t know the full details of the zoo incident, but as I said only a moment’s distraction is needed for a child to get into trouble. A zoo should account for this and ensure its enclosures are child-proof.

As for the china shop, apples and oranges. A life is not at stake in that scenario.

 

[Bill_Martin]

What is the nature of a gorilla with regard to young children who are not their own offspring: to kill them or protect them?

“Just tossed him around a little bit”? That does not sound too good to me.

Hard to say. From the videos, this one didn’t seem aggressive, since it could have killed him if it wanted to. It basically held onto the kid for a while and walked around pulling him. The danger was more that the child would die by accident. There was one point where he was dragged by his feet with his head underwater (probably bouncing off rocks too). That could easily have been fatal.

I think the zoo made the right choice.

 

[mikekle]

In the video that has come out it shows the gorilla holding on to the child and appears to be bathing it… This would seem similar behavior to an incident that happened a few years ago at another zoo. Other comments were that he dragged the child and threw it against the wall. The video is like 2 1/2 minutes and the child was in there considerably longer, so hard to say what else might have happened for sure. Seemed to have been plenty of time to traquilize the animal if they wanted to. Of course if there was imminent danger, the animal would have to be killed.

The only video Ive seen was when both were in that moat, but on the news this morning, they had still pictures of the kid in the actual gorilla habitat, so I guess the gorilla must have carried the kid up from the moat to the habitat. Many people I knew were shocked the gorilla could even get down into that moat, I have been to this exhibit, its a big and deep moat with smooth walls, Im still not sure how he got down and out again.

 

[7_Sorrows]

Are there no tranquilisers in existence that could have as quickly sedated the animal as a gunshot could?

evidently not.

 

[mikekle]

I read the park has been there for 38 years and this has never happened. I bet a lot of kids have gone through in that time. The mother was doing something wrong if her child was able to get into the enclosure.

This is something I dont understand either, this 4 yr old was the first kid in 38 yrs to do this, surely with kids coming and going every single day for all those years, at least some of them would have noticed the same way in…?

Something tells me the kid was out of the mothers sight for much longer than she stated, but Im sure the security video will tell the real story, the news this morning, the police said the mother is not facing charges yet, but they are investigating.

From what Ive seen of the local publics response, they will end up charging her with something, ALOT of people are pretty upset about this.

 

[7_Sorrows]

Hard to say. From the videos, this one didn’t seem aggressive, since it could have killed him if it wanted to. It basically held onto the kid for a while and walked around pulling him. The danger was more that the child would die by accident. There was one point where he was dragged by his feet with his head underwater (probably bouncing off rocks too). That could easily have been fatal.

I think the zoo made the right choice.

he didn’t seems agressive in the few minutes of footage, but that could have changed at any moment. the danger was both that the gorilla could have easily killed the boy or the boy could have died by being dragged around. I really don’t even want to think of what could have happened.
yes, the zoo made the right choice, but the gorilla is dead because of both the parent’s negligence and the zoo’s. I am sure this boy will never forget being in the hands of a 700 lb. gorilla for the rest of his life or looking into its eyes.

 

[7_Sorrows]

This is something I dont understand either, this 4 yr old was the first kid in 38 yrs to do this, surely with kids coming and going every single day for all those years, at least some of them would have noticed the same way in…?

Something tells me the kid was out of the mothers sight for much longer than she stated, but Im sure the security video will tell the real story, the news this morning, the police said the mother is not facing charges yet, but they are investigating.

From what Ive seen of the local publics response, they will end up charging her with something, ALOT of people are pretty upset about this.

yes, if there is any security video that shows how the boy ended up in the moat. if not, they need to bring the boy back and have him explain how he did it so they can remedy the problem and check all other exhibits. this kid must have really been hot to want to get into that water.