Monday, November 3, 2014

Girl aged 8 mauled to death by circus tiger after sneaking into big cats' cage for closer look --where were her parents?

  • By Steve Kelly


A little girl has been mauled to death by a circus tiger after slipping through bars and into the big cats' enclosure to get a closer look at the fearsome beasts. Eight-year-old Juan Niu was attacked after sneaking off from her family to get a better look at the huge predators. The youngster had been taken to Leheledu Amusement Park while visiting relatives in China's south-western Chongqing municipality.

Park managers had hired a travelling circus to entertain visitors and had set up temporary holding pens for the animals. The young girl walked up to the cage and managed to slip through the bars at which point she was pounced on by a tiger, and mauled in front of horrified park visitors. Although animal trainers were quickly at the scene and rescued the child, she was barely alive when she was taken to hospital and was declared dead on arrival. The park has offered the family compensation and promised to beef up security to make sure nothing like this happened again.

Park spokesman Manchu Hung said: "Nothing terrible like this has ever happened before and we take the safety of our visitors very seriously. "We will pay all compensation necessary to the family and will make sure it's not possible for anything similar to ever happen again."

Only last month, a nine-year-old boy had his arm torn off by a bear when he had jumped past the guard rail and reached inside the cage to feed it at a zoo in China's Henan province.

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