Auckland Zoo attack

Press, 17 August 1978, Page 6

Auckland Zoo attack

PA Auckland Auckland Zoo staff were still mopping up yesterday! after a night rampage by vandals that left at least two animals dead, others injured :and a building hacked with 'an axe. The director. Mr D. Wood, said that anybody breaking ; into the zoo at night must be I mad. “Words fail me,” Mr Wood ; said, “They must have been completely around the bend.” When staff arrived on Sunday morning they found a wallaby dead and an emu with its leg smashed. The emu died later while being operated on. A pea-fowl had been thrown into a bear’s pit, jaguars attacked with sticks j poked through cage bars, and a door and fences set upon with an axe taken from the zoo.

The jaguars were sedated yesterday and given drugs to stop infection from the I gashes in their bodies. [ The staff were still stunned. The curatori veterinarian, Mr G. W. ’Meadows, was bitter about : the attack as he tended the ! jaguars. A keeper, Miss June I Mayor, said that the cats would have been driven to a frenzy as thev were attacked in the dark. Mr Meadows found deep holes in the neck of one jaguar as he gave the sedated animals antibiotics ■and other drugs. Mr Wood said it was not known how many persons were involved. The Auckland police were as dismayed as zoo staff: “The wrong animals are behind bars," said SeniorSergeant W. D. Hall, the police information officer.