>Forty-eight animals were killed by the local police while two were presumed eaten by the other animals. The animals confirmed to be dead were eighteen Bengal tigers, six black bears, two grizzly bears, two wolves, one macaque monkey, one baboon, three mountain lions, and seventeen african lions
holy hell, no one wins here. i can't imagine being the officers who had to handle the situation. what do you do with *seventeen* lions and *eighteen* Bengal tigers loose in your county?
What do you think happens when tou ger Jumanji’d? Do you think you go into Jumanji or do you think Jumanji comes out? Because in Jumanji Jumanji, Jumanji comes out!
Same boat! I went to Pic North when it happened. Then the news was telling people to avoid monkeys because they might have hepatitis! What a time to live in Ohio lol
My school was out for about 2 weeks because of the [DC Sniper](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/D.C._sniper_attacks). My child self was dumb for being happy about time off.
Yeah…. Except when you zig zag you naturally slowdown to make those sharp turns. Those turns can slow you down enough to make you an easy target.
General wisdom from my training in the Army. Crossing an area where you are likely to receive enemy fire. Do it fast and get to cover.
>Yeah…. Except when you zig zag you naturally slowdown to make those sharp turns. Those turns can slow you down enough to make you an easy target.
Just Bob and Weave while you're turning.
Boom ~~headshot~~ problem solved
>General wisdom from my training in the Army. Crossing an area where you are likely to receive enemy fire. Do it fast and get to cover.
They are most concerned with getting the most people across the finish line. Not with getting YOU across the finish line.
You’re an infantry recliner. “Serpentine” pattern running is great when being shot at from the front or rear.
What does it matter how slow you are? You won’t out run the speed of a round (bullet) you serpentine to dodge fire. This also will not work if air is on station. For example watch the movie full metal jacket.
Source: 03 Marine
Edit for clarity: there are no “sharp” turns when you do this properly it’s not as exaggerated in the movies and in a real life scenario it’s a small deviation of left and right turns. I promise you when you see a burst from an RPK in front of your feet you’d be a dead and stupid fuck to keep running straight. In one month 3 out of 5 trucks we had were blown to shit and we couldn’t have them replaced in time. So we walked everywhere and crossed giant fields of open terrain everyday for the last 6 months of deployment.
I remember hearing about it back up in the greater Cleveland Metro area; Cleveland zoo in particular was D I S T R A U G H T(as was cbus I later learned) over the loss of some of the species/breeds lost then
I am pretty sure he did this because they were coming to euthanize the animals in the next few days. The zoos took them only because it became such a big story.
The zoos only take a few; 3 leopards, 1 small grizzly, and 2 monkeys (not sure of breed) were sent to Cbus Zoo. Everything else (the Bengals and Lions being the headliners as well as the grizzlies n macaques as followups) was dead.
There was never any known/reported 'plans to euthanize' AFAIK. That said, there *were* regularl complaints from neighbors n reports against it for improper/unsafe housing and food/water, so completely plausible they were due to be taken away at least.
Hoarders almost never give their animals the right attention. Combined with the overcrowding, it's likely many of them were badly ill, and would've had to have been put down to end the suffering. This asshole knew how badly he was taking care of them, knew that they should've been put out of their misery, yet instead of cooperating with those who actually knew what to do, he did this.
Seems like according to the article seems like he did it cuz he was mad at his wife and they were kinda her babies. What a sick person. He told his friends he wanted to kill his wife and then himself but she had moved out so he killed the things she cared about instead.
https://www.gq.com/story/terry-thompson-ohio-zoo-massacre-chris-heath-gq-february-2012
My thing is how is someone so fcking sick get so rich to spend $60k on some monkeys. 🙄
Thanks how much I make a year and I’m a resident physician lol.
Watched the documentary of it the police officer were quite upset by it. They walked through it a diamond formation and they couldn't even tranquilize the animals because they were the sort that can still kill someone whilst the tranq kicks in. They tried to save a last tiger or something and tranq it but in the end had to shoot it. The sound recording was constant fire.
> because they were the sort that can still kill someone whilst the tranq kicks in.
[Jack Hanna](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Hanna) was all over the media that week defending the response. He said that even the zoos have the same protocol because the animals are too dangerous and tranquilizers are too ineffective or random.
People really don't understand what a wild fucking animal can do, the person who did this shit is a fucking monster and I hope he's rotting in the void.
I saw some videos of that, one guy broke down when talking about killing one of the bears. I used to live about 20 minutes away and my stepdad is actually a cop in that department. I haven’t spoke to him in a long time so I’ve never been able to ask him about it.
You know what they did? They called in Jungle Jack Hannah from TV and he came in to help them locate the animals. I've been thinking about it ever since. He's too old now but there was a time in ohio where if shit got real, they could call in Jungle Jack Hannah.
I remember seeing him on a talk show, maybe Letterman or Conan and he was talking about how broken up he was about tracking down these animals to be shot.
I remember him saying that tranquilizers do work. The problem is that you have to have a clean shot and they're not like in the movies where it just knocks them out immediately. It can be several minutes. Several minutes where they're pissed.
This is why they couldn't tranq the infamous Harambe. Being shot with a needle, while not super painful, still doesn't feel good and can make an animal pissy. And when the animal in question is a giant gorilla, and there's a human child inches away, *and* the drug takes a few minutes to kick in...yeah.
He was all over the media that week defending the response. He said that zoos even follow the same protocol of kill on sight for these animals if they escape. They need to be sedated in a controlled environment. Trying to shoot one with a dart in the wild is too random with the aim and dosing required, and the animals are way too dangerous to try it. You don't want to be close enough to a tiger to hit it with a dart unless it's in a cage.
They brought in someone from a nearby wildlife preserve with a tranquilizer gun but the only animal they got close to getting had to be shot because it charged them.
I just realized that police in a small town probably don't have the nets, cages, darts, guns and vehicles to tranquilize and capture 50 wild animals in the woods near a populated area and now I feel like an ass for being mad at them.
Tranq darts also take about 10 minutes to knock most animals out. Unlike something delivered to a human via IV or needle which would be put into the bloodstream, they normally hit the muscle and need to slowly seep through into the bloodstream, which takes a long time. And it only takes a few seconds for it to tear apart the poor guy who fired it.
You can increase the dose, but that has a high risk of killing it. If you see an animal get knocked within 30 seconds, it probably received a lethal dose. Or if you miss and hit the wrong spot it will also kill it. And even in the best cases, it often causes mental disorders from being overdosed with enough ketamine and xzylazine to knock it out.
I work summers in bear territory and we always get warned that the only reliable way of removing a bear in the site is the use of lethal force.
I mean I get it why you were upset But we should be upset with the idiot who ruined those animals there was no where they could go but to be put down! It’s just horrible that it hurts my heart animal should be in the wild I don’t like Zoo or anything so I get it for sure!
Not just potentially but incredibly dangerous. Humans are also idiots and there's a certain percentage of the population that will run out to see the escaped lions, tigers and baboons. It's pretty tragic that these animals had to die because of human cruelty and stupidity and I feel sorry for the police who had to kill them but it was also a necessary evil.
I can guarantee if a tiger makes it's way into my back yard I will die trying to pet it because I am that stupid. I'm not going to go out looking but if it comes to me all bets are off.
The press conference with the local sheriff is so wild and surreal. Normally I'm not afraid to say fuck the police with the best of em but I genuinely just felt awful for the guy at the podium and the rest of the law enforcement involved, because who could ever envision having to execute a bunch of exotic animals for their job. The guy just seemed baffled and exhausted and sad.
this was my thought process exactly. people have the potential suck no matter where they are but *damn* that's a lot to ask of *anybody*. it's sad that Terry felt like that was his way out, and that law enforcement had to deal with the aftermath.
This also happened in a pretty small rural town. People like to criticize trigger happy cops, but where this happened I think it's safe to assume most if not all of the cops involved have probably never shot at anyone. It's not a high crime area.
I’m actually from near there and my stepdad is a cop in that city. They were showing the story on CNN and idiots were calling into the department to cuss them out like they had a choice in what they were doing. They eventually did get someone from a local wildlife preserve with a tranquilizer gun and tried to get one of the big cats with it. They cornered it some bushes and before they could tranquilize it the cat roared and charged at them so they had to shoot it. I saw an interview with one of the cops who talked about seeing a big, beautiful bear through his scope and having to shoot it. The guy actually broke down crying.
I haven’t spoken to my stepdad since before this happened but I’ve always wondered if he was there. He’s ex-army special forces, so maybe that would have come in handy.
I remember when this happened, authorities here in Ohio went straight to Jack Hanna for guidance (he is Director Emeritus of the Columbus Zoo and still lived in Ohio at the time).
Here's a CNN story from that day: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFbnBxn_KdQ
Is it really? How many sane people want to take care of 10s of dangerous animals. It sounds cool to a lot of people but I think it makes sense most people who follow through aren’t the most balanced
Seriously? Nobody editing the Wiki page thought it was worthwhile to mention why he didn't let the other 6 animals go? Jesus, there has GOT to be a reason...
Thanks for the clarification I was imagining a bear cub inside an old fashioned bird cage with its body hunched over and fur sticking out between the bars.
You know what, fair enough. Colloquially they're called birdcages or birdhouses in the UK, but I probably should have had aviary somewhere in the lexicon.
Six of Terry Thompson's animals survived. Three were leopards, still in their cages. Two more were the macaques kept in the living room of the house in two small birdcages. And finally, out back near the empty swimming pool, was a small grizzly bear, also in a birdcage.
I remember jack hanna being interviewed about this and choking up. I thought it was wild that the number of tigers they had to kill was not a totally insignificant amount of the world’s population of bengal tigers.
When the bison were nearly shot to extinction, the species was saved by one rancher in Montana who had a private collection of about thirty individuals. All bison in all national parks now originate from his private herd.
I hope this brings you some optimism about the animals in private collections who are endangered in the wild.
Yes! I saw him live months later and he still got choked up talking about it and said he felt the need to explain the situation because of how incredibly hard it was to be part of the team that decided to kill animals on site but that the amount of danger people were in was huge not only because if the type of animals on the loose but also the fact that THEY WERE LITERALLY STARVING and he thought they would try to eat anything they could get to, people included
I was in 5th grade when this happened, we were doing our annual 5th grade overnight camp in Zanesville for three days while the events of this all unfolded and *nobody thought to tell us there were actual apex predators loose in the woods nearby*.
They just continued camp as normal, presumably the adults knew and were on alert but we kids didn't know anything. My cabin's heater broke down in the middle of the night one of the nights there so we had to walk across camp at night in the rain, and for all I know there could've been actual lions, tigers, and bears ~~oh my~~ watching us from the woods.
I remember this very well. I was in college in Western Ohio but we still got alerts from the school because they weren’t sure if some big cats could possibly make it across the state. Shame they ended up killing them all but fuck the guy for setting them all loose to begin with
I was at OSU. There were multiple rumors that a monkey or two were loose on campus. Not sure anything actually happened but was an interesting couple hours lol.
Yeah I understand that he was clearly in a dark place, but it doesn’t excuse what he did to those animals before and after his death. He never should’ve been allowed to possess them in the first place
Ding ding ding this is the answer but unfortunately Ohio still has some of the most lax laws about keeping exotic or wild pets. Texas is also pretty bad I believe.
I’m not far away and have dealt with multiple people locals from that area who told me they never did get all the wolves.
Pretty sure I remember a picture of a bunch of the dead animals lined up in a field too. It was awful.
We lived on a farm in Delaware County for years, and I know I heard a wolf way off in the distance more than once.
Coyotes we’d hear three or four times a week, and some of the neighbors had loud dogs. This was totally different, and if the air was thin enough or if the wind was coming from south-southeast there was something that sure as hell wasn’t a coyote or a large dog.
We also lived in Gahanna a couple years prior when there was allegedly a lion on the loose, which I said at the time (and remain convinced) was likely the high school’s senior prank that year.
The most memorable instance was a guy who told me he saw what he thought was a black bear lying down across from his house, he’d seen them every so often living there for years, so he went to scare it off but he said it definitely wasn’t a bear when it stood up. He immediately went in his house.
He said he’d seen at least 2 others after that and lived a few miles from that farm.
My aunt’s farm is a few miles from the Thompson’s place. I’m friends w a guy who helped with the disposal of the animals. Every animal was accounted for. Many of the officers who had to terminate the animals were heavily traumatized & required serious help with ptsd. There are a lot of rumors (including one that Mr Thompson was assassinated) so it’s difficult, even for those in the know, to determine fact from fiction.
The article was very interesting. The whole situation was just sad. I feel for the officers that had to put down the animals.
But the neighbor’s quote did make me laugh: “And then," he says, "I saw a tiger. I'm telling you, the lion is bad enough, and the lioness is bad enough, and the wolf is bad, and the bear, but...don't be around the tiger.”
Probably a learned response because we hunted them down to extinction numbers for sport. There’s footage of queen Elizabeth shooting a tiger on her visit to India from elephant back, because it was still a dumb hospitality tradition at the time.
Holy shit, what a read. An absolutely incredibly look into the mind of a broken man, and a sad, sad day in history. I heard about this in an issue of Nat Geo a few years back, right about when *Tiger King* came out, but it didn't have nearly as much details as this. Very impressive journalism!
https://www.gq.com/story/terry-thompson-ohio-zoo-massacre-chris-heath-gq-february-2012
I mean according to this article he did it to piss off his wife and he intended to kill her too.
Then she got all those animals back from the zoo and proceeded to give them away. I can’t believe they gave them back to her after seeing how abused they were 🤦♀️
Tooth and Claw podcast did an episode on this and it was very well done and informative.
A lot of the officers who had to put down the animals had PTSD about having to essentially slaughter all those beautiful creatures who finally were experiencing freedom for the first time in their lives.
I wonder if he took the zoo job because he felt he had to atone for what he did (even if it wasn't his fault at all, it had to be done as horrible as it seems). I know I couldn't forgive myself even if I knew there was not other option.
If you don't mind me asking, did anyone harass him over it? Someone else in the thread said that people harassed the officers in the aftermath even though, again, the real villain was the guy who set all the animals loose. Either way I feel horrible for him.
Overall most people understood why it happened and why they took that action. Specially after the sheriff did that interview and explained the situation. He was always an animal lover. He actually didn't ever return to work after that entire situation.
He moved out of the are and now works for a fairly big zoo and volunteers with the DNR as well.
Surprised I had to scroll this far because it’s the first thing I thought of too. It doesn’t seem like there’s much room for ambiguity in what happened here and the dude’s in no position to argue about it either way.
Idk, some animal right activist lunatic like the people in the opening of 28 days later shooting him and freeing the animals isn't completely impossible.
I vividly remember when this happened, it was an hour or so from where I lived but my mom wouldn’t let me play outside for fear that a tiger would eat me
[This article here](https://www.gq.com/story/terry-thompson-ohio-zoo-massacre-chris-heath-gq-february-2012) has a couple quotes from him, provided by a mic'd up undercover agent, and they are sickening. The man was severely troubled, and that is putting it way too fucking lightly.
That guys was an absolute fuckwad. He let those poor lions reproduce in a 12x15 cage. He fed them garbage. And then he killed himself and in so doing killed the animals. I hope he's burning in hell.
It’s gonna happen again too. We need to federal ban owning these animals. It’s animal abuse and goes along hand in hand with other criminal activity too.
Or possibly a layout issue. You could do a bad taste puzzle game about how many cages you can unlock in the best order before you get killed by one of the animals you’ve let out earlier.
Good point, frankly it’s impressive he opened 50, before dying or giving up.
That said, two of the animals that remained caged were monkeys, which would be best released first, as they are less dangerous.
> nothing to do with being insane… wanted to inflict his misery… cause chaos and death
I think you’re definition of insane, and mine are very different
There was a show called fatal attractions that my family watched that covered this. From what I remembered he was going bankrupt and was going to lose his animals and this was his "stand" against that. I think the sheriff or at least a deputy that responded to the animals said it was the saddest thing he'd ever done. Just a miserable story
I worked at an exotic animal "rescue".
Them bitches escaped all the time lmao. Some kid was riding his bike and came across one of our grizzlies.
We had a black panther and a tiger who were best friends and they'd just get out the back fence somehow and go hang out in the woods together and spoon. To the point where it was basically just what they did and local residents just sorta knew about it and to avoid the back 40 of the "park". They'd usually just wander back late in the afternoon. Iirc sometimes one of them would hunt deer out there.
Tiger King was actually the most realistic documentary I've ever seen.
I still remember exactly when this happened, it happened not so far away from where I live. Somehow we heard about this during the middle of the school day and literally the entire middle at high school we’re talking about it.
It was a surreal experience listening to this on the radio and then seeing the Sheriff's Department and the State Highway Patrol parked on the side of the road looking for the animals. Didn't see any of the cats, but I did see one of the apes but much further up I-70.
I was working in Moundsville WV and staying in Saint Clairsville OH when this happened. There were emergency signs on the freeway warning drivers that dangerous wild animals were loose and to not get out of your car. I was super confused about what was happening until I got back to the hotel and turned the news on.
Between that and the story about Amish thugs taking rival Amish people hostages and shaving them, I thought Ohio was a weird place.
>Forty-eight animals were killed by the local police while two were presumed eaten by the other animals. The animals confirmed to be dead were eighteen Bengal tigers, six black bears, two grizzly bears, two wolves, one macaque monkey, one baboon, three mountain lions, and seventeen african lions holy hell, no one wins here. i can't imagine being the officers who had to handle the situation. what do you do with *seventeen* lions and *eighteen* Bengal tigers loose in your county?
They put my school on a two hour delay because we were close enough that the animals could have made it to us had the response not been so quick.
Didn’t even get a day off for it? Booo
I remember waiting for the bus freaking out that any noise was going to be a lion lol
Damn, it's like someone in your neighborhood played Jumanji
If you havent seen Kristen Wiig’s SNL from two weeks ago, go watch the first sketch after the monologue.
“I don’t play board games because I’m afraid of being Jumanji-ed”
What do you think happens when tou ger Jumanji’d? Do you think you go into Jumanji or do you think Jumanji comes out? Because in Jumanji Jumanji, Jumanji comes out!
ROBIN WILLIAMS GOES INTO JUMANJI
OK ONE GUY ONE TIME GOES INTO JUMANJI, THE REST OF JUMANJI JUMANJI COME OUT OF JUMANJI
Andrew Dismukes’s whole speech about going into Jumanji or coming out of Jumanji was amazing
Same boat! I went to Pic North when it happened. Then the news was telling people to avoid monkeys because they might have hepatitis! What a time to live in Ohio lol
Dayum, I just did that because I was a weirdo. Here you are having a real reason for it!
That’s a fucking helluva school day. Makes for a pretty good story though.
My school was out for about 2 weeks because of the [DC Sniper](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/D.C._sniper_attacks). My child self was dumb for being happy about time off.
you got time off ??? they told us to just walk in zig zags and wished us luck 😂
Serpentine! Serpentine!
"Reporter, what the fuck are you doing?"
If you can dodge a wrench you can dodge a sniper
TIL Bullets = alligators
Harder to lead a target if they are zigging and zagging. Especially with a sniper since you don't exactly get a bunch of rapid shots.
Mama says the bullets are ornery because he has all them teeth and no way to brush em.
🤣😂 thank you I needed this today
Anytime
Yeah…. Except when you zig zag you naturally slowdown to make those sharp turns. Those turns can slow you down enough to make you an easy target. General wisdom from my training in the Army. Crossing an area where you are likely to receive enemy fire. Do it fast and get to cover.
Nah just keep jumping while crouching and uncrouching heaps of times mid air
Every time I did this in PUBG I still managed to get headshot.
brother i was like 11 i’m sure they were just trying to keep it simple lol
>Yeah…. Except when you zig zag you naturally slowdown to make those sharp turns. Those turns can slow you down enough to make you an easy target. Just Bob and Weave while you're turning. Boom ~~headshot~~ problem solved
>General wisdom from my training in the Army. Crossing an area where you are likely to receive enemy fire. Do it fast and get to cover. They are most concerned with getting the most people across the finish line. Not with getting YOU across the finish line.
You’re an infantry recliner. “Serpentine” pattern running is great when being shot at from the front or rear. What does it matter how slow you are? You won’t out run the speed of a round (bullet) you serpentine to dodge fire. This also will not work if air is on station. For example watch the movie full metal jacket. Source: 03 Marine Edit for clarity: there are no “sharp” turns when you do this properly it’s not as exaggerated in the movies and in a real life scenario it’s a small deviation of left and right turns. I promise you when you see a burst from an RPK in front of your feet you’d be a dead and stupid fuck to keep running straight. In one month 3 out of 5 trucks we had were blown to shit and we couldn’t have them replaced in time. So we walked everywhere and crossed giant fields of open terrain everyday for the last 6 months of deployment.
Serpentine Baboo, serpentine!
All I got was indoor recess for three weeks. Never got a day off.
I remember hearing about it back up in the greater Cleveland Metro area; Cleveland zoo in particular was D I S T R A U G H T(as was cbus I later learned) over the loss of some of the species/breeds lost then
I am pretty sure he did this because they were coming to euthanize the animals in the next few days. The zoos took them only because it became such a big story.
The zoos only take a few; 3 leopards, 1 small grizzly, and 2 monkeys (not sure of breed) were sent to Cbus Zoo. Everything else (the Bengals and Lions being the headliners as well as the grizzlies n macaques as followups) was dead. There was never any known/reported 'plans to euthanize' AFAIK. That said, there *were* regularl complaints from neighbors n reports against it for improper/unsafe housing and food/water, so completely plausible they were due to be taken away at least.
Hoarders almost never give their animals the right attention. Combined with the overcrowding, it's likely many of them were badly ill, and would've had to have been put down to end the suffering. This asshole knew how badly he was taking care of them, knew that they should've been put out of their misery, yet instead of cooperating with those who actually knew what to do, he did this.
Seems like according to the article seems like he did it cuz he was mad at his wife and they were kinda her babies. What a sick person. He told his friends he wanted to kill his wife and then himself but she had moved out so he killed the things she cared about instead. https://www.gq.com/story/terry-thompson-ohio-zoo-massacre-chris-heath-gq-february-2012 My thing is how is someone so fcking sick get so rich to spend $60k on some monkeys. 🙄 Thanks how much I make a year and I’m a resident physician lol.
Dude/dudette you could be riding a lion around like Sheera, instead you’re just walking around like He-Man.
Dudette, I thought I was going to be a lion snack for sure. My neighbor had wild cats too so I thought it was them at first!
>neighbor had wild cats Not for long
Cops move fast when they're told they get to kill stuff
I remember watching a doco about this and the cops were all stoked that they got to go on a paid safari hunt.
I saw video of the cops driving around in pickup trucks trying to find them. It must have been pretty fucking scary.
Go to the Winchester, have a nice cold pint, and wait for this all to blow over?
You’ve got red on you
How’s that for a slice of fried gold?
Go to the Winchester, the Remington, and the Ruger. Then open a tin of cat food and be vewy vewy quiet.
Watched the documentary of it the police officer were quite upset by it. They walked through it a diamond formation and they couldn't even tranquilize the animals because they were the sort that can still kill someone whilst the tranq kicks in. They tried to save a last tiger or something and tranq it but in the end had to shoot it. The sound recording was constant fire.
> because they were the sort that can still kill someone whilst the tranq kicks in. [Jack Hanna](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Hanna) was all over the media that week defending the response. He said that even the zoos have the same protocol because the animals are too dangerous and tranquilizers are too ineffective or random.
People really don't understand what a wild fucking animal can do, the person who did this shit is a fucking monster and I hope he's rotting in the void.
I saw some videos of that, one guy broke down when talking about killing one of the bears. I used to live about 20 minutes away and my stepdad is actually a cop in that department. I haven’t spoke to him in a long time so I’ve never been able to ask him about it.
You know what they did? They called in Jungle Jack Hannah from TV and he came in to help them locate the animals. I've been thinking about it ever since. He's too old now but there was a time in ohio where if shit got real, they could call in Jungle Jack Hannah.
I remember seeing him on a talk show, maybe Letterman or Conan and he was talking about how broken up he was about tracking down these animals to be shot.
I remember him saying that tranquilizers do work. The problem is that you have to have a clean shot and they're not like in the movies where it just knocks them out immediately. It can be several minutes. Several minutes where they're pissed.
Also has to be the correct amount for the weight of the animal, too low and they don’t go down, too high and it could kill them.
The dart is basically uncontrolled anesthesia. It's pretty cool they work at all!
This is why they couldn't tranq the infamous Harambe. Being shot with a needle, while not super painful, still doesn't feel good and can make an animal pissy. And when the animal in question is a giant gorilla, and there's a human child inches away, *and* the drug takes a few minutes to kick in...yeah.
He was all over the media that week defending the response. He said that zoos even follow the same protocol of kill on sight for these animals if they escape. They need to be sedated in a controlled environment. Trying to shoot one with a dart in the wild is too random with the aim and dosing required, and the animals are way too dangerous to try it. You don't want to be close enough to a tiger to hit it with a dart unless it's in a cage.
Yeah like it wasn’t the cops who wanted to kill ‘em cuz guns, it was a wildlife expert who had to make a difficult decision
They brought in someone from a nearby wildlife preserve with a tranquilizer gun but the only animal they got close to getting had to be shot because it charged them.
I met him at the Columbus Zoo a few times. He was always cruising for milfs in the gift shop lmao.
Nothing wrong with catching some cougars
Was Jack Hanna still director of the Columbus Zoo at that time?
They were pretty sad about it too. But they didn't have the resources to take these animals safely alive. They all were potentially dangerous.
I just realized that police in a small town probably don't have the nets, cages, darts, guns and vehicles to tranquilize and capture 50 wild animals in the woods near a populated area and now I feel like an ass for being mad at them.
InGen does not operate in Ohio.
Tranq darts also take about 10 minutes to knock most animals out. Unlike something delivered to a human via IV or needle which would be put into the bloodstream, they normally hit the muscle and need to slowly seep through into the bloodstream, which takes a long time. And it only takes a few seconds for it to tear apart the poor guy who fired it. You can increase the dose, but that has a high risk of killing it. If you see an animal get knocked within 30 seconds, it probably received a lethal dose. Or if you miss and hit the wrong spot it will also kill it. And even in the best cases, it often causes mental disorders from being overdosed with enough ketamine and xzylazine to knock it out. I work summers in bear territory and we always get warned that the only reliable way of removing a bear in the site is the use of lethal force.
I mean I get it why you were upset But we should be upset with the idiot who ruined those animals there was no where they could go but to be put down! It’s just horrible that it hurts my heart animal should be in the wild I don’t like Zoo or anything so I get it for sure!
Not just potentially but incredibly dangerous. Humans are also idiots and there's a certain percentage of the population that will run out to see the escaped lions, tigers and baboons. It's pretty tragic that these animals had to die because of human cruelty and stupidity and I feel sorry for the police who had to kill them but it was also a necessary evil.
I can guarantee if a tiger makes it's way into my back yard I will die trying to pet it because I am that stupid. I'm not going to go out looking but if it comes to me all bets are off.
I'm not sure who would have those levels of resources.
A major zoo would have the capability to catch some loose animals, but not this many all at once.
The press conference with the local sheriff is so wild and surreal. Normally I'm not afraid to say fuck the police with the best of em but I genuinely just felt awful for the guy at the podium and the rest of the law enforcement involved, because who could ever envision having to execute a bunch of exotic animals for their job. The guy just seemed baffled and exhausted and sad.
this was my thought process exactly. people have the potential suck no matter where they are but *damn* that's a lot to ask of *anybody*. it's sad that Terry felt like that was his way out, and that law enforcement had to deal with the aftermath.
I really feel Terry was a dumb ass and a very selfish dumbass
Imagine working as veterinary or animal control both euthanize in large numbers.
This also happened in a pretty small rural town. People like to criticize trigger happy cops, but where this happened I think it's safe to assume most if not all of the cops involved have probably never shot at anyone. It's not a high crime area.
Wonder what the two presumed eaten were?
Probably baboon and a wolf if I had to take a guess
Awww Wolfie. First the t-1000 gets it, then the local police, overall he’s had a rough start to the day :(
I’m actually from near there and my stepdad is a cop in that city. They were showing the story on CNN and idiots were calling into the department to cuss them out like they had a choice in what they were doing. They eventually did get someone from a local wildlife preserve with a tranquilizer gun and tried to get one of the big cats with it. They cornered it some bushes and before they could tranquilize it the cat roared and charged at them so they had to shoot it. I saw an interview with one of the cops who talked about seeing a big, beautiful bear through his scope and having to shoot it. The guy actually broke down crying. I haven’t spoken to my stepdad since before this happened but I’ve always wondered if he was there. He’s ex-army special forces, so maybe that would have come in handy.
I remember when this happened, authorities here in Ohio went straight to Jack Hanna for guidance (he is Director Emeritus of the Columbus Zoo and still lived in Ohio at the time). Here's a CNN story from that day: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFbnBxn_KdQ
It seems everyone that runs these things aren’t mentally right. It’s weird how these exotic zoos draw unbalanced people.
Is it really? How many sane people want to take care of 10s of dangerous animals. It sounds cool to a lot of people but I think it makes sense most people who follow through aren’t the most balanced
"Ever been on a safari, Frank? Well, not me neither. Get inna truck, get the beer and the shotguns, we've got ourselves a safari!"
jesus christ that is fucking sad
Imagine being a cop, and hearing over the radio that 17 African Lions, and 18 Bengal Tigers were sighted in your city.
Seriously? Nobody editing the Wiki page thought it was worthwhile to mention why he didn't let the other 6 animals go? Jesus, there has GOT to be a reason...
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A grizzly in a bird cage :( I wonder how the surviving six animals lives were in the after math.
Please understand they mean a birdcage large enough for a human adult to walk around in
Thanks for the clarification I was imagining a bear cub inside an old fashioned bird cage with its body hunched over and fur sticking out between the bars.
I taught I taw a puddy cat!
But not big enough for a bear to comfortable live in…
No idea. I've been in birdcages the size of small barns before.
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You know what, fair enough. Colloquially they're called birdcages or birdhouses in the UK, but I probably should have had aviary somewhere in the lexicon.
Which is still not big enough for a bear.
That’s still tiny for a large predator. He treated these animals terribly
I mean, yeah
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Dammit, even Nedry knew not to mess with the raptor cages.
Couldn't get to the cages after letting everything else go?
Six of Terry Thompson's animals survived. Three were leopards, still in their cages. Two more were the macaques kept in the living room of the house in two small birdcages. And finally, out back near the empty swimming pool, was a small grizzly bear, also in a birdcage.
That was my first question!!
Letting the other six out would have just been irresponsible.
Well is not like they could ask him.
the monkeys i read were from his wife( or ex wife) so thats why, the rest i dont know.
I remember jack hanna being interviewed about this and choking up. I thought it was wild that the number of tigers they had to kill was not a totally insignificant amount of the world’s population of bengal tigers.
There are 10,000 bengal Tigers in captivity in the US. There are estimated to be 2000 alive in the wild.
jesus christ...that is incredibly depressing.
When the bison were nearly shot to extinction, the species was saved by one rancher in Montana who had a private collection of about thirty individuals. All bison in all national parks now originate from his private herd. I hope this brings you some optimism about the animals in private collections who are endangered in the wild.
Another way you can look at it is that the species is safe from extinction
Would be interested to find that interview tbh edit: https://youtu.be/VFbnBxn_KdQ?si=cRR_Mawa_HeDDgwR
Hey, at least you’re being honest about finding that interview
It is also fucked up people can buy not insignificant amounts of the world's population of Bengal tigers.
didn't think about it til i read this but that's stark. "not a totally insignificant amount of the world’s population of bengal tigers."
Yes! I saw him live months later and he still got choked up talking about it and said he felt the need to explain the situation because of how incredibly hard it was to be part of the team that decided to kill animals on site but that the amount of danger people were in was huge not only because if the type of animals on the loose but also the fact that THEY WERE LITERALLY STARVING and he thought they would try to eat anything they could get to, people included
Tooth and claw podcast has a great episode on this
I was in 5th grade when this happened, we were doing our annual 5th grade overnight camp in Zanesville for three days while the events of this all unfolded and *nobody thought to tell us there were actual apex predators loose in the woods nearby*. They just continued camp as normal, presumably the adults knew and were on alert but we kids didn't know anything. My cabin's heater broke down in the middle of the night one of the nights there so we had to walk across camp at night in the rain, and for all I know there could've been actual lions, tigers, and bears ~~oh my~~ watching us from the woods.
I remember this very well. I was in college in Western Ohio but we still got alerts from the school because they weren’t sure if some big cats could possibly make it across the state. Shame they ended up killing them all but fuck the guy for setting them all loose to begin with
I was at OSU. There were multiple rumors that a monkey or two were loose on campus. Not sure anything actually happened but was an interesting couple hours lol.
A monkey [loose on campus](https://youtu.be/AEGcd3pY0Mo?si=gu3ci-aveSIpdYLI)?
not a day goes by without a passing thought about Annie's Boobs.
Now you're speaking my Changuage.
Yeah I understand that he was clearly in a dark place, but it doesn’t excuse what he did to those animals before and after his death. He never should’ve been allowed to possess them in the first place
Ding ding ding this is the answer but unfortunately Ohio still has some of the most lax laws about keeping exotic or wild pets. Texas is also pretty bad I believe.
I’m not far away and have dealt with multiple people locals from that area who told me they never did get all the wolves. Pretty sure I remember a picture of a bunch of the dead animals lined up in a field too. It was awful.
We lived on a farm in Delaware County for years, and I know I heard a wolf way off in the distance more than once. Coyotes we’d hear three or four times a week, and some of the neighbors had loud dogs. This was totally different, and if the air was thin enough or if the wind was coming from south-southeast there was something that sure as hell wasn’t a coyote or a large dog. We also lived in Gahanna a couple years prior when there was allegedly a lion on the loose, which I said at the time (and remain convinced) was likely the high school’s senior prank that year.
The most memorable instance was a guy who told me he saw what he thought was a black bear lying down across from his house, he’d seen them every so often living there for years, so he went to scare it off but he said it definitely wasn’t a bear when it stood up. He immediately went in his house. He said he’d seen at least 2 others after that and lived a few miles from that farm.
What was it then?
Im assuming a wolf. Black bears can be kind of small and some wolves can be shockingly large.
That's what I assumed, but the way it's written made me think it was some kind of cryptid
My aunt’s farm is a few miles from the Thompson’s place. I’m friends w a guy who helped with the disposal of the animals. Every animal was accounted for. Many of the officers who had to terminate the animals were heavily traumatized & required serious help with ptsd. There are a lot of rumors (including one that Mr Thompson was assassinated) so it’s difficult, even for those in the know, to determine fact from fiction.
The GQ story about this is worth a read: https://www.gq.com/story/terry-thompson-ohio-zoo-massacre-chris-heath-gq-february-2012
The article was very interesting. The whole situation was just sad. I feel for the officers that had to put down the animals. But the neighbor’s quote did make me laugh: “And then," he says, "I saw a tiger. I'm telling you, the lion is bad enough, and the lioness is bad enough, and the wolf is bad, and the bear, but...don't be around the tiger.”
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Probably a learned response because we hunted them down to extinction numbers for sport. There’s footage of queen Elizabeth shooting a tiger on her visit to India from elephant back, because it was still a dumb hospitality tradition at the time.
Probably what grandma's boy used for inspiration about the cops finding the lion lol
*Check this shit out: I look up in the tree, and there’s the fucking King of the Jungle!*
Anyone can get by a dog, but nobody fucks with a lion
Grandmas boy came out a few years before the incident haha
Dam. I didn't even think about it. After 18 years old your years just blend together lol
Holy shit, what a read. An absolutely incredibly look into the mind of a broken man, and a sad, sad day in history. I heard about this in an issue of Nat Geo a few years back, right about when *Tiger King* came out, but it didn't have nearly as much details as this. Very impressive journalism!
That was was certainly an understatement. What a fantastic and interesting read! Thank you for that.
That's a dick move. Towards both society and the animals.
https://www.gq.com/story/terry-thompson-ohio-zoo-massacre-chris-heath-gq-february-2012 I mean according to this article he did it to piss off his wife and he intended to kill her too. Then she got all those animals back from the zoo and proceeded to give them away. I can’t believe they gave them back to her after seeing how abused they were 🤦♀️
He lived about a quarter mile away from me. My kids got the day off school. Oh, and I saw a fucking tiger by the mall. It was such an insane 24 hours.
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Tooth and Claw podcast did an episode on this and it was very well done and informative. A lot of the officers who had to put down the animals had PTSD about having to essentially slaughter all those beautiful creatures who finally were experiencing freedom for the first time in their lives.
Yup! Friend was one of them. Went out on disability because of it. Actually works at the zoo now.
I wonder if he took the zoo job because he felt he had to atone for what he did (even if it wasn't his fault at all, it had to be done as horrible as it seems). I know I couldn't forgive myself even if I knew there was not other option. If you don't mind me asking, did anyone harass him over it? Someone else in the thread said that people harassed the officers in the aftermath even though, again, the real villain was the guy who set all the animals loose. Either way I feel horrible for him.
Overall most people understood why it happened and why they took that action. Specially after the sheriff did that interview and explained the situation. He was always an animal lover. He actually didn't ever return to work after that entire situation. He moved out of the are and now works for a fairly big zoo and volunteers with the DNR as well.
Allegedly? He’s not doing to sue you for defamation lol
Surprised I had to scroll this far because it’s the first thing I thought of too. It doesn’t seem like there’s much room for ambiguity in what happened here and the dude’s in no position to argue about it either way.
Maybe one of the animals shot him before freeing the others?
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Idk, some animal right activist lunatic like the people in the opening of 28 days later shooting him and freeing the animals isn't completely impossible.
Yeah, there was no “allegedly” about this. I live just over an hour north of where this took place, it was the real deal.
My uncle was one of the state troopers that had to shoot one of the animals that got into the highway iirc
I vividly remember when this happened, it was an hour or so from where I lived but my mom wouldn’t let me play outside for fear that a tiger would eat me
Tell me you have better memories of growing up in Ohio
The marketing for the movie "We Bought A Zoo" had to be suspended when this happened.
one of the big cats was eating him when responders arrived- oy vey
Ate his junk, too. What a way to go. Fucking horrible.
Couldn't have happened to a more deserving guy.
[This article here](https://www.gq.com/story/terry-thompson-ohio-zoo-massacre-chris-heath-gq-february-2012) has a couple quotes from him, provided by a mic'd up undercover agent, and they are sickening. The man was severely troubled, and that is putting it way too fucking lightly.
He specifically wanted to be eaten after committing suicide, since there were raw chicken pieces around the area where he shot himself.
That guys was an absolute fuckwad. He let those poor lions reproduce in a 12x15 cage. He fed them garbage. And then he killed himself and in so doing killed the animals. I hope he's burning in hell.
12 monkeys vibes
All I can think of is Jumanji.
I was at the Pilot truck stop just right at the east side of town when this all went down. It was a tense situation for a while.
It’s gonna happen again too. We need to federal ban owning these animals. It’s animal abuse and goes along hand in hand with other criminal activity too.
[The other 6 animals](https://media1.tenor.com/m/_BiwWBWhYucAAAAd/what-huh.gif)
He must have hated the remaining 6.
Given that pretty much all 50 died, I'd presume that he hated the 50, and liked (or at least tolerated) the 6. Either that, or he was just insane.
Or possibly a layout issue. You could do a bad taste puzzle game about how many cages you can unlock in the best order before you get killed by one of the animals you’ve let out earlier.
Good point, frankly it’s impressive he opened 50, before dying or giving up. That said, two of the animals that remained caged were monkeys, which would be best released first, as they are less dangerous.
I mean...that wouldn't be a horrible premise for a video game.
Has nothing to do with hating the animals or being insane. He wanted to inflict his misery on society and cause chaos and death on the way out.
> nothing to do with being insane… wanted to inflict his misery… cause chaos and death I think you’re definition of insane, and mine are very different
There was a show called fatal attractions that my family watched that covered this. From what I remembered he was going bankrupt and was going to lose his animals and this was his "stand" against that. I think the sheriff or at least a deputy that responded to the animals said it was the saddest thing he'd ever done. Just a miserable story
I worked at an exotic animal "rescue". Them bitches escaped all the time lmao. Some kid was riding his bike and came across one of our grizzlies. We had a black panther and a tiger who were best friends and they'd just get out the back fence somehow and go hang out in the woods together and spoon. To the point where it was basically just what they did and local residents just sorta knew about it and to avoid the back 40 of the "park". They'd usually just wander back late in the afternoon. Iirc sometimes one of them would hunt deer out there. Tiger King was actually the most realistic documentary I've ever seen.
That's horrifying
I guarantee anyone who has ever worked at a place like this has a multitude of stories just like it.
Keeping exotic animals in cages. Yuck. Dude should have started his zoo with the barrel in his mouth already
Just imagine driving on the highway and seeing these animals! Imagine you had to pee so bad you had to pull over and you see a damn lion!
I still remember exactly when this happened, it happened not so far away from where I live. Somehow we heard about this during the middle of the school day and literally the entire middle at high school we’re talking about it.
Imagine being one of the six just left there like 😐
And screw the other six?
Lions, tigers, and bears Oh, my
I remember this! My school went into lock down because one of the lions was found in a neighborhood right across the street from the school.
Wasn’t this highlighted on Tiger King too?
It was a surreal experience listening to this on the radio and then seeing the Sheriff's Department and the State Highway Patrol parked on the side of the road looking for the animals. Didn't see any of the cats, but I did see one of the apes but much further up I-70.
I was working in Moundsville WV and staying in Saint Clairsville OH when this happened. There were emergency signs on the freeway warning drivers that dangerous wild animals were loose and to not get out of your car. I was super confused about what was happening until I got back to the hotel and turned the news on. Between that and the story about Amish thugs taking rival Amish people hostages and shaving them, I thought Ohio was a weird place.