15 Times People Have Fallen Into Zoo Exhibits

One of the most fun things to do in the summer, especially if you have little ones, is visit the zoo. It’s pretty cool to be able to see the wild animals up close and personal, animals that we would never otherwise get to see in person because they don’t live in our part of the world, are far too dangerous to be close to, or are very difficult to get near. Zoos provide the world with opportunities to watch these stunning animals and learn more about them.

But keeping wild animals in captivity also presents certain unique challenges. The predators among them, and even those which aren’t necessarily predators, like the monkeys, pose a threat to the safety of the zookeepers and the zoo’s visitors. Safety is of the utmost importance at zoos, and they all have strict protocols and safety measures in place to prevent any accidents, like falling into one of the animal enclosures, from happening. But sadly, sometimes, there’s only so much you can do, and accidents will still happen. And sometimes, there’s nothing anyone can do if a person wants to willingly jump into an enclosure.

There are far too many tragic tales of people losing their lives (or coming close) at the zoo in this way. Often, the victim is a young child, making the situation even more heartbreaking. Although there seem to be an endless number of these kinds of stories, here are 15 stories of people who, in one way or another, wound up alone with deadly animals in a pit at the zoo.

15. Negligent Parents Cause Toddler’s Fall Into Cheetah Enclosure… and They Follow Him Down!

At the Cleveland Metropark Zoo in Ohio, a two-year-old boy fell into a cheetah exhibit in 2015. Cheetahs are especially dangerous for any human, let alone a toddler, because they’re the fastest land animal on the planet, and although they don’t usually recognize humans as prey, there are several cheetah attack victims out there who would say otherwise. After the boy fell 10-12 feet into the cheetah enclosure, his legs were injured, making his situation even direr. But by some miracle, the cheetahs ignored him. They also ignored the child’s parents, who followed him into the exhibit to save him. But the zoo officials wanted to push for child endangerment charges against the boy’s parents because they believe it was their fault. Executive Director of the zoo Dr. Christopher Kuhar said, “Unfortunately, we have a number of eyewitness accounts that point to the strong likelihood that the child was dangled over the rail.”

14. Three-Year-Old Mothered By a Gorilla After Falling In

This incident got a lot of attention when it happened, of course, but it was brought back into the spotlight two decades later when a similar incident occurred with Harambe. In 1996, an unnamed child, aged three, managed to slip away from his mother while at the Brookfield Zoo in Cincinnati, Ohio. He squeezed through a barrier by the gorilla enclosure and then fell 15 feet into the pit of gorillas. One of them, an eight-year-old rare western lowland gorilla named “Binti Jua,” mothered the boy for several minutes. She picked him up, cradled him, and even carried him to the paramedics. During this time, she also carried around her own 17-month-old baby on her back. The toddler was alert and crying when the paramedics took him from Binti Jua, and amazingly, he only suffered a broken hand and minor cuts. Between a fall like that and being at the mercy of giant gorillas, he was one lucky kid.

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