Tatiana

[mdlbear]

I've always loved zoos, and the San Francisco Zoo in particular. But it's a sadder place today. Sometime this afternoon a Siberian tiger named Tatiana somehow escaped from her cage. She killed a young man, and was attacking two more when she was shot and killed by the police. It was almost exactly a year after she mauled one of her keepers during a feeding. (News stories here and here.)

The chaoswolf "adopted" Tatiana's next-door neighbor, Tony, about a year and a half ago. We went to a feeding; I remember Tatiana vividly -- dark-striped, sleek, graceful, and restless. She had come to the zoo from Russia, like my maternal grandmother whose name was also Tatiana, though everyone called her by the diminutive, "Tanya". I always thought of Tatiana by that name, too.

I feel terribly sorry for poor, lost Tanya. The world may be a little safer today, but a creature of great beauty and a fierce, proud spirit has gone out of it.

Comments

[mdlbear]

All true. Hard to tell in advance which ones will be too wild to keep, but there must have been at least a few warning signs with Tatiana. I expect that people who work in zoos have a bit of a blind spot when it comes to their charges; it's the same kind of familiarity that causes industrial accidents elsewhere.

Walking around the zoo is still safer per passenger-mile than getting in a car or crossing the street at a busy intersection.