Cincinnati Gorilla Shooting: A Very Different Outcome Than Similar Incident At Brookfield Zoo [Video]


As this video clearly shows, a 1996 incident at the Brookfield Zoo ended much differently – and much less tragically – than when a gorilla was shot dead Saturday at the Cincinnati Zoo, reported NBC Chicago.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Xr1YjwDNm4

“On Aug. 16, 1996, a small boy climbed a railing and fell 18 feet into the gorilla den at the Brookfield Zoo,” wrote the NBC affiliate. “An 8-year-old female gorilla named Binti Jua made national headlines when she picked up the unconscious boy and protected him from the other primates.”

Although the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Gardens has publicly called what happened to 17-year-old male gorilla Harambe a “tragic accident,” eyewitness accounts point to the possibility that perhaps – as was the case almost exactly two decades ago at Chicago’s Brookfield Zoo – the primate actually had no intention of harming the child.

Still, the endangered Western Lowland gorilla was shot and killed Saturday as horrified onlookers watched at the Cincinnati Zoo’s Gorilla World exhibit. The highly upsetting incident is prompting questions about everything from the safety of the enclosure to how the boy’s guardians could have allowed him to fall.

Although the identity of the boy who fell into the gorilla enclosure at the Brookfield Zoo in 1996 was never released, he did make a full recovery from the fall and Binti Jua quickly became a national hero for the heroic deed, which was caught on camera. In fact, Binti was named “Hero of the Year” by Newsweek and one of the “Most Intriguing People of 1996” by People magazine after the Brookfield Zoo incident.

Now 28-years-old, Binti Jua still lives at the Brookfield Zoo and her deeds are still remembered by spectators who come to view the exhibit she has called home for so many years. According to Chicago’s WGN-TV, Brookfield Zoo workers who witnessed the rescue say they will never forget the image of the massive gorilla cradling the human child with her own baby – 17-month-old Koola – clinging tightly to her back through the entire ordeal in a move that some have attributed to her maternal instincts.

“One on-looker recorded video of the rescue and that video was seen around the world,” wrote WGN-TV. “Binta Jua quickly became a Hometown Hero and an international sensation.”

Still, the boy who fell into the gorilla enclosure at the Brookfield Zoo back in 1996 suffered a broken hand, as well as a few cuts to his face and spent four days in the hospital before returning home. As it turns out, the boy from Saturday’s incident in Cincinnati only spent a short time at the nearby Children’s Hospital Medical Center, with “serious but non-life-threatening injuries,” according to New York Magazine.

The zoo’s Dangerous Animal Response Team arrived on the scene within 10 minutes and made the decision to put Harambe down, despite the fact that the massive 400-pound gorilla had not attacked the child and – much like Binit Jua at Brookfield Zoo two decades ago – even seemed to be protecting him at times from the frantic crowd of onlookers. In fact, the boy was calmly sitting between the animal’s legs at the time the gorilla was shot.

“It does not seem that he ever attacked the child, but he did periodically grab and pick him up,” wrote New York Magazine. “The gorilla even seemed to be protecting the boy from the crowd at times.”

Another parallel to the 1996 incident at Brookfield Zoo involves the fact that in both cases the enclosures failed to protect the endangered gorillas from the stupidity and carelessness of humans – an undeniably sad fact no matter how you feel about the actions taken by zoo officials in either incident.

[Photo via Twitter]

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