FSTDT Forums
Community => Society and History => Topic started by: Ultimate Paragon on May 30, 2016, 09:10:33 pm
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http://www.wlwt.com/news/police-responding-incident-at-cincinnati-zoo/39773436 (http://www.wlwt.com/news/police-responding-incident-at-cincinnati-zoo/39773436)
I get that the kid's life took priority, but was killing the gorilla really necessary?
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This is a terribly sad situation. I think it probably wasn't necessary but these things are always easier with hindsight. You have to remember the Zoo staff acted in the heat of the moment. The other thing to remember is that the Harambe was a 200kg gorilla who could have killed the kid without even meaning to. Apparently the handlers tried to get Harambe to leave the enclosure but he wouldn't. Two of the female gorillas in the enclosure left when called. I don't know but I suspect all the screaming probably didn't help. It certainly would have agitated Harambe. However looking at it, it certainly looked like he was protecting rather than hurting the child. It would have been good if they could have tried a bit longer to get him to leave the enclosure before shooting him.
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It would have been nice to go for tranquilizer first. But, like davedan said, in the heat of the moment and with the kid's life quite possibly at stake, I'm not going to call them evil things.
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If the child had died I wouldn't want to write "couldn't find tranques" on the incident report, or quote that in court.
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The issue with tranquilisers is:
1. It would take a few minutes to work (even at the highest dose they could deliver)
2. It would likely piss the Gorilla off;
3. The gorilla was probably more likely to hurt the kid as he was drifting into unconsciousness and confused.
If however saving the kid wasn't the highest priority then it would have been a viable option. Whatever happened I'm glad I wasn't the guy making the choice.
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Yeah, davedan, I didn't read the tranquilizer thing to after I payed last night. However, I stands by what I said that it would have been nice.
UP, to answer your question of was killing the gorilla necessary, I'd say maybe. However the way you worded it, it would seem to imply it wasn't. A 450 pound gorilla has a small child. You have under 3 minutes to make the call. I'd like to hear your thoughts on the matter.
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If it had been a much older silverback, who are typically calm and gentle with gorilla infants, it might have been an option to tranq him. But Harambe was only 17, just shy of breeding age, and had already roughly grabbed the boy and run dragging the child 30-40 feet in the moat in a way he would not have done with an infant gorilla. It seemed to me that Harambe was agitated and regarding the child as a prize to use in a dominance display. Male gorillas often do the same thing by grabbing branches and running around with them, waving the branch and slamming the branch at things and at other gorillas like a weapon. The senior zoo spokesman, who ultimately okayed the decision to shoot Harambe, was having a hard time holding back the tears while speaking to the press about it.
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There was an almost identical event in England many years ago where a kid fell into either a chimp or gorilla enclosure (forget which) and that was resolved without any animals being shot. The situation was slightly different, one of the females seemed to be standing over the kid to protect him from the males, but I think it does kind of show killing the gorilla might not have been necessary.
However I don't blame the zoo, I can more than understand why they wouldn't want to take any chances. I mean imagine what would've happened if they chose not to shoot and the child was killed by the gorilla.
I'm going to be that guy and say ultimately it's the kids parents' fault, not the zoo's. I know keeping an eye on your kids at all times is hard but its a zoo, its full of dangerous animals and things to climb and fall off of - pay attention to your fucking kids and if you can't then don't go.
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Based on what I've read the authorities on site -And I do believe that the staff of the Zoo are the best authority on how big a danger to the kid the gorilla was- concluded that they had to kill the gorilla. The zoo manager who gave the kill order was crying when he later talked about the situation but he really felt that it was necessary.
Hindsight is 20/20 and all that but they didn't have much time and saving the child was the most important thing for them so wasting any time debating the issue or trying to get the kid and losing lives would have been much worse.
EDIT:
http://imgur.com/gallery/1GFojf6
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Based on what I've read the authorities on site -And I do believe that the staff of the Zoo are the best authority on how big a danger to the kid the gorilla was- concluded that they had to kill the gorilla. The zoo manager who gave the kill order was crying when he later talked about the situation but he really felt that it was necessary.
Hindsight is 20/20 and all that but they didn't have much time and saving the child was the most important thing for them so wasting any time debating the issue or trying to get the kid and losing lives would have been much worse.
EDIT:
http://imgur.com/gallery/1GFojf6
Thing is though with the same incident in England that I mentioned they didn't even use tranqs, if I remember correctly they rescued the kid without shooting the apes with anything at all. I could be miss remembering though, it was a fucking long time ago. Either way, I am certain that no-one and nothing was killed.
But again, regardless it is not the zoos fault; members of the public should never have put them in a situation where they had to make that decision in the first place.
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They tried calling the gorillas away from the enclosure which would have allowed them to get the kid out without hurting any of them. The others obeyed, the male who was shot didn't. I don't see they had other options without endangering human lives.
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They tried calling the gorillas away from the enclosure which would have allowed them to get the kid out without hurting any of them. The others obeyed, the male who was shot didn't. I don't see they had other options without endangering human lives.
Agreed, anything else they tried to do could've resulted in the gorilla becoming mad and harming the child. Tranq the gorilla, he's not going to pass out immediately (yahoo answers says 10 minutes is the norm), but he has a sharp needle in his ass which is surely gonna piss him off. As davedan said, the barbituates would also make him drowzy and confused, and like humans, the gorilla wouldn't be in his right state of mind, which could make the situation worse. Sending a bigger adult to get the child may make the gorilla territorial and at the very least puts another person in danger. Trying a nonlethal shot has the same effect as the tranq, but without knocking the gorilla out in 10 minutes. The only other option is to do what the zoo did, call the gorillas away from the child to make it safe for someone to go in and save him. The other gorillas complied, Harambe did not, and that forced the difficult decision.
It is a tragedy that the gorilla had to go, but the zoo made the right choice to save the child. I really want to see some kind of criminal punishment for the mother (like really, how does your 4 year old fall into a gorilla enclosure). But, nevertheless, the zoo did the right thing.
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I wouldn't jump into conclusions about the mother's culpability. It's possible that something else attracted her attention for a few seconds which can be enough for a kid to get himself into trouble if something is wrong with the safety precautions. The incident needs to be investigated to see if the mother or the zoo were negligent but we shouldn't blame anyone without all the facts.