from wire reports: LAS VEGAS Oct. 4 Illusionist Roy Horn of the duo Siegfried & Roy remained hospitalized in critical condition Saturday, a day after a tiger attacked him during a show, and authorities said they still didn't know his chances for recovery. Horn suffered a serious injury to the left side of his neck and underwent surgery late Friday. "The overwhelming likelihood is that we'll have to wait two or three days before we really understand the full extent of these injuries," Alan Feldman, an MGM Mirage spokesman, said Saturday. Horn, along with longtime partner Siegfried Fischbacher, have been a Las Vegas Strip staple for years, performing their magic show to sold- out crowds at The Mirage hotel-casino. The shows, with their signature white tigers and lions, are among the best known and most expensive on the Strip. Halfway into Friday night's performance, Horn appeared alone on stage with the tiger and told the crowd the animal was making its debut in the show a claim hotel officials said was part of the act. The tiger, which weighs about 600 pounds, then lunged at Horn, who tried to beat the animal off with a microphone. "I knew he was in trouble right away. I was horrified," said Diane Weightman, who was in the audience. "I wanted to jump on stage and help him. I didn't know what to do." Andy Cushman, also in the audience, said Horn "looked like a rag doll" as the tiger dragged him off the stage. Feldman said stage crew members used fire extinguishers to distract the animal and free Roy. After the attack, Fischbacher appeared on stage and told the 1,500 audience members the performance was canceled, Cushman said. Hotel officials said the show has been canceled indefinitely. The tiger involved in the att82 responses total.
There's a Simpsons reference here, of course. 8O
"Pardon me, Roy, ain't that the cat who chewed your new shoes?"
re #1: for those whose Simpsons memory is weak, there's a gag in
one episode ( http://www.snpp.com/episodes/1F08.html ) where
"flamboyant" (the show's description) magicians "Gunter and Ernst"
(transparent Siegfried and Roy clones) are mauled on stage by their
own white tiger when the tiger gets fed up with the humiliation
involved in riding around on stage on a unicycle wearing a funny
costume..
> Inside one of the showrooms, Gunter and Ernst demonstrate their
> talented albino tiger riding a unicycle. "A round of applause,
> please, for Anastasia. She loves show-business. So much
> nicer than the savagery of the jungle, ja?"
>
> In a flashback, we see Anastasia sleeping peacefully in Africa.
> [Africa? -mcnally.] Behind her two men approach in a jeep.
> "Hey, tiger!" one of them calls out, "Wake up!" He shoots a
> tranquilizer dart into her, and she slumps over. The memory
> angers her sufficiently to attack her owners and tear them
> to shreds.
Life seems to be imitating the Simpsons frequently lately. I recently
read an article about the CEO of Red Lobster being driven out because
of disastrous losses from the chain's misguided "all you can eat crab
legs" promotion, virtually the same problem that afflicted Captain
McAllister when Homer discovered the "all you can eat" seafood special at
The Frying Dutchman... ("'Tis no man. 'Tis a remorseless eating machine.")
Well, I hope Roy's OK.
ignore the next two items, they are duplicates of this one. I was lagging when I entered this item and hit enter on backtalk more than once...oops
he had it coming.
I hope he is ok. But, I cant really feel sorry for him. I mean, he was working in a dangerous job but unlike most other people with dangerous jobs, he was very well compensated.
I would say that he voluntarily accepted the risk, and compensation seems irrelevant.
according to news reports, prognosis on Roy of Siegfried & Roy is grim. the report at www.lasvegasreviewjournal.com indicates he's had massive blood loss, from the bite to the neck and as a consequence later suffered a stroke. Employees of the Siegfried and Roy show at the Mirage have been told they have to consider other options in their careers. Very sad. I guess it raises the argument, which PETA and other animal rights groups often make, that exotic animals shouldn't be make to perform in shows. However, PETA couldn't claim these tigers were mistreated because as stated, they had a huge facility and lived like kings. They live a lot better no doubt than the elephants who work in the Barnum and Bailey circus no doubt.
I dont know. There are some people who take high risk jobs because they dont have any other options and thusly arent really paid well. I feel sorry for those folks. I was watching a documentary about railroad workers in the 19th century recently that made me think of that. I mean, I felt sorry for all the guys who lost fingers, hands, legs, their lives working for a few bucks a day. I dont feel sorry for Roy really and the major difference is that he was compensated well for taking the risk. *shrug*. PETA can very well claim the tigers were mistreated. The truth is that they probably werent. However, I think this illustrates that keeping animals like Tigers is a dangerous business. They arent meant to be kept as pets or as trained performing show beasts. It is dangerous to do so. If people want to take on those risks, it is ok with me. I imagine that Siegfried and Roy knew what they were doing and didnt put the public at risk, just themselves.
slynne, you must also remember that siberian tigers are an endangered species, and Siegfried&Roy regularly subsidized breeding programs and are among the world's largest benefactors to programs to protect exotic animals. Siegfried has said it is their way of paying their performing tigers-- the tigers perform and in exchange tens of millions of dollars go to protecting and breeding their species so their kind will survive. It is a fair tradeoff. These tigers do a lot more for their kind by performing than they would otherwise. Siegfried&Roy even have a tiger maternity ward in their facility at the Mirage where they directly subsidize the breeding of these endangered animals. Montecore, the seven year old tiger who attacked Roy, according to stories won't be hurt or killed because of what happened. Montecore got confused and put his jaw around Roy's arm. Roy hit Montecore with his microphone, which is a trainer's technique to get him to stop. But Roy's microphone was on since he'd been talking to the audience. Thus when he hit the tiger with it, the sound of the mic hitting the tiger resonated throughout the building on the speakers. The amplified sound spooked Montecore and he reacted instinctively. As stated, Montecore is a siberian tiger, an endagered species, and it is illegal to harm him. He will probably be fired from his job as a show tiger, lose his cushy digs at the Mirage, and be sent off to a zoo somewhere.
Re 10: A man gets his neck torn open by a tiger, and you don't feel sorry for him? What exactly would it take?
Perhaps they are getting to old to deal with the tigers. I mean, he is what 65 now? He lost his focus for a moment and it cost him.
re12: an man willingly gets into a cage with a tiger and gets mauled. why should i feel sorry for him, save for the pity i feel at his having some sort of emotional disability. yeah, i guess i feel sorry for him after all...as i do for folks who intentionally OD or jump off a bridge.
I feel most sorry for people to whom something tragic happens through no fault of their own. The emotion shifts, however, when the tragedy lies in the inherent hazards in actions they have chosen. The end member is is thinking that "at least they died doing what they love to do". However one can still feel sympathy for their friends and relatives.
Reasons, so far, to say you don't feel sorry for a man whose neck was torn open by a tiger: "he had it coming" (So the tiger was actually trying to execute him?) "he was working in a dangerous job but unlike most other people with dangerous jobs, he was very well compensated" (You only feel sorry for poorly compensated animal-trainers who have their necks torn open? What income level is the cutoff point for you?) "he voluntarily accepted the risk" (And that hardens your heart, how?) "why should i feel sorry for him, save for the pity i feel at his having some sort of emotional disability" (That would be a very nice response if you weren't using "emotionaly disability" as an insult. Sorry for noticing.)
I dont know what the income cut off point would be. I dont especially want to find out either. I guess that I feel that anyone who chooses to take on such risks and then has it come and bite them in the ass (or neck) doesnt get my sympathy. I really dont feel sorry for this guy. FWIW, I dont feel sorry for hypothetical junkies who OD or take dives off bridges. In fact, it is a rare suicide that makes me feel sorry for the person anymore. Mostly I just think they are selfish assholes. I do sometimes feel sorry for people who have dangerous jobs who take those jobs because they dont have other options or because they want to help people. I felt sorry for the public servants who died on 9/11. Anyhow, I dont have to justify my feelings. feelings dont have to be logical. If I knew the guy, I probably would feel sorry for him. If I had ever seen this show, I probably would be more prone to feeling sorry for him. But, I simply dont feel sorry for this guy and his income has a lot to do with it. His work saving an endangered species, while admirable, doesnt make me feel sorry for him either.
How do you feel about firefighters injured in the line of duty?
The ones I feel sorry for are the kids who were in the audience and saw that happen. There are always a lot of kids at their shows and a gory scene like that could haunt a young child for a long time. We watch a lot of high risk sports. Like auto racing, and skiing, and boxing. In those sports, which we find entertaining, accidents happen and people get hurt. Roy told people in the ambulance, according to one story, that he views what happened as an accident, takes all the blame himself, and wants noone to blame the cat.
that's the only thing that makes me feel even remotely sorry that he was hurt...that he recognized that it wasn't the cat's fault. re18: are you serious?
Of course I'm sorry he was hurt. He loves those animals and it's sad that he miscalculated and was injured. I'm hoping that they will take him at his word and not harm/kill the tiger in question, who was, accordin to the news reports I saw, a "rescued" tiger and not one which Roy had raised from birth.
resp:18 - I do feel sorry for firefighters who are injured in the line of duty so I guess the income cut off is somewhere between firefighter and megastar
I think when one feels sorry for people who work in dangerous jobs, besides the income level and the need to actually work these jobs, one takes into coonsideration whether the job really helped other people. Firefighters risk their lives to save people from fires. Roy risked his life to entertain people. Maybe not as necessary as saving lives, but still a public service of some sort. If the tigers weren't mistreated, and it sure sounds like they were not, I don't see anything wrong with using them in a show. It's like having actors and clowns. Sure they're animals, and not born to entertain, but animals weren't born to be pets either. I doubt these animals were whipped till they danced or anything like that. I feel sorry for the man. And if that news-source is true about him not wanting to blame the cat for his injury, I have some additional respect for him. It sure seems like he really loves these animals. (But I would assume that he would work with tigers that he'd raised from birth, rather than a "rescued" animal, only because you know their past and have a much better knowledge-base to work with when determining how they'd react)
According to the news (and stories I've seen in the past), Roy would study his cats and only have them do things on stage that they could do, that they were likely to do, anyway -- what they had a talent for. He also shared his home with them, and would be the first to hold and clean the baby tigers as they were born, so they recognized him *as* a tiger. Inasmuch as any human can be so recognized, I suspect. He did his best to understand and work with them, and while it was in the cause of entertainment, it was also because he loved and respected them, and figured that people would want to preserve something that gave them pleasure.
Did he do anthing about preserving this species *in the wild*? From what I have read about it, it seems his breeding program only preserved the species in zoos and other captivity. It seems to me to be the penultimate cruelty to preserve a species only outside its natural habitat.
I thought that he donated money to the habitats in the wild. I could be wrong. But I'd rather be alive in a zoo than my species be dead. I don't know how an animal feels about that, but I suspect that life enjoys being alive.
And tigers pace and monkeys bounce off their bars....seems to me they are reacting to imprisonment in much the same sense as a human would.
The Toledo Zoo has habitats that seem to be decent for the animals. The tigers there didn't pace. And Roy's tigers had a whole estate that they shared with him and Siegfried. They weren't caged, and had the freedom of the house and estate, at least during the day (not sure what the nighttime arrangements were). Not saying it's like having a whole range to oneself, but it's a damn sight better than living free and being killed horibly by a poacher.
The efforts of The Nature Conservancy are for habitat protection for rare, theatened and endangered species. In the long run, this is more economical for the preservation of species than is maintaining captive breeding populations. Did Roy and Siegfried donate heavily to habitat preservation? (I did some Googling to find out, but as yet without success.)
white tigers and white lions are not natural inany habitat. It is a mutation that propably occured shortly before the maharajas came to power in india.
Is it possible to feel sorry for the mutilated trainer but still congratulate the tiger for, well, being a tiger? I don't know much about the motivations of Mr. Roy but the tiger doesn't belong on a stage, jumping through hoops and obeying a guy in tights. Somehow, with that one bite, it regained some of its long lost dignity. I also root for the bull in bullfights.
Albinism in animals (and humans) is perectly natural, bru. But albino animals are not a separate species and breed like any other members of the species. They belong in the natural population as part of its diversity.
albinism is a rare occurrance (can they breed???) and is not well tolerated by the rest of the population generally. albino offshoots usually nee to be seapratred and protected. i feel quite bad for roy - and firefighters too (re #20) who invest their being for our safety/enjoyment and afll victim to happenstance.
This response has been erased.
Yes, albino animals (including humans) can breed, and I have never heard that they are "not well tolerated by the rest of the population generally". Please cite some urls that provide data that support your contention.
This response has been erased.
LOL Well the tiger was acting like a tiger. No argument there. I don't think anyone here is advocating getting back at the tiger, are they?
(surprisingly not. most animals that attack humans are euthanized; I haven't heard that this tiger is destined for a similar fate.)
At least Roy is not advocating that. He said that he wanted it to be unharmed, during the ambulance ride to the hospital. I don't think he or anyone he knows were shocked by this -- I think that is why I do feel sorry for him, because he accepted the risks and accepted that he'd been very lucky not to be attacked. And because he had a stroke after the attack. That is definitely not something they tell you about in tigers one-oh-one, that being attacked by one will cause a stroke! (The news story I read implied that it was because of the massive blood loss. I don't think I'd ever heard of a stroke from that particular cause before. Has anyone else?)
Tigers play rough with each other. They also have much tougher skins than humans do. Except for the size, there's really not that much difference in terms of psychology between tigers and domestic cats (although in the wild it's true tigers are generally solitary and domestic cats act more like lions.) What's "just play" to a cat can be pretty rough in human terms. Strokes are basically a sudden loss of consciousness due to a lack of oxygen in some part of the brain - this could be caused by a blood clot, or blockage or rupture of some blood vessel, usually inside the brain. I guess a rupture of a major blood vessel in the neck doesn't quite qualify, but the resulting greatly reduced blood pressure can't help matters any inside the brain. If a air bubble or blood clot from wound were to make its way inside the brain, that would certainly qualify though.
Apparently some neck injuries can result in stroke. In seaching Medscape, I found "Cervical Spinal Manipulation Linked to Stroke From Vertebral Arterial Dissection". That "dissection" is a form of trauma to the blood vessel.
I recently saw a PBS or Discovery show on introducing Tigers to Africa, after captive breeding. It was something like a 5 year project to get two into the wild. Brother and Sister. In a wild animal preserve, with a large number a acres.
Are you sure it was Africa and not India. Tigers are not native to Africa.
This response has been erased.
The White tigers are not albinos. They do not have pink eyes, the main charactaristic of albinism. They are a seperate species. They breed true.
Depends on what version of albinism you are talking about. It is, in general, just a genetic trait of non-pigmentation. However I will acknowledge that http://www.white-tigers.org/ asserts that "they are not albino". However they are definitely not a separate species. This "white tiger partial albinism" is due to a recessive gene and only occurs when both mates carry it. But they can mate with any other receptive Bengal tigers.
Coincidentally there was another tiger incident here in NYC. Some guy liv ing in a rent controlled apartment in a high rise in Harlem was found keeping two pets, a full grown half siberian/half bengal tiger named Ming and a giant alligator named Al. It was a three bedroom apartment and Ming the tiger and Al the alligator had their own bedrooms. The tiger's bedroom had a bed and an indoor sand pit. The alligator's bedroom had a bed and a baby pool for Al to swim in. The tiger and the alligator had apparently bonded, and this man considered them to be his brothers. The animal control authorities have just yesterday removed the animals and shipped them off to a zoo. The guy was interviewed and is heartbroken that the housing authority won't let him have his pets back. But really, an apartment in a housing project surely isn't the ideal place for a tiger and an allligator to live. The man is being charged with reckless endagerment, even thougb it is clear he loved thos animals.
and poor Ming the tiger was shown on the front page of today's papers looking miserabler, in a cage at the zoo. The tiger had been domesticated, used to his own bedroom. They are saying his readjustment will be difficult
Re #45: Bruce... look up the definition of "species". I'm sure it will show that you're wrong (again). I will lay money down that white tigers are inter-fertile with the normal forest breed of their native land, and that they're no more different species than Siamese cats and Maine Coons.
(my first wife and I lived next door to a pair of tigers in downtown Lansing, MI. Sorry; no stories of maulings. "Saw a tiger today," was part of our conversation and about as ordinary as talking about the weather.)
re #35 . born and raised on a farm ... been there, seen that. dad would separate teh albinos fromt eh general population for their protection. i have seen, rarely because they were usually removed to safety early, the resident non-albino population attack teh 'different ones.' 'different ones' alwyas need protection from teh general population, adn taht applies to humans as well.
Richard, wasn't the man in question mauled? I can understand why the authorities would take the animals away. They are an endangerment to the rest of the people, even if they never harmed their "borther"
re #52...the man in question was bit on the leg by the tiger while playing with it. when he went to the hospital to have the bite mark tended to, that is when authorities realized it wasn't any dog bite. then the cops went to his apartment and saw the tiger looking out the window at them
This response has been erased.
This response has been erased.
I think if I wanted to donate money to save tigers, I'd spend it largely on captive breeding programs and the like. Reintroducing tigers into the wild sounds like a good way to spend a lot of money and accomplish nothing. A tiger takes a lot of space, and few humans are willing to share space with them. It seems like a doomed cause.
In the long run, habitat protection would be cheaper - and have a better result. A captive breeding program is forever. Land needs to be purchased just once. The main problem with captive breeding programs is that they are initially cheaper, and hence more likely to be done, but with a worse long-term outcome. Additional problems with captive breeding programs are genetic drift and the threat of diseases in small populations.
This response has been erased.
I'm finally starting to remember the famous tiger/lion/beast attack that happened on some old live-TV variety show. Might have been Ed Sullivan. Anyway, the animal attacked somebody, and because it was live and such they best the director could do was switch to a camera on the audience. A very shocked-looking audience, with horror on their faces. If I couuld remember more detail I'd probably be able to find the info on Google. I did see a clip of it a few years ago..
Siegfried was on Larry King tonight, and he said that when the paramedics were working on roy back stage, and he was bleeding profusely, the first and only thing Roy said to Siegfried was "don't harm the cat" Siegfried showed pictures of he and Roy with Montecore, the tiger in question and made clear the tiger is like a child. He says Roy tripped and fell, and the tiger freaked out and acted instinctively and dragged him offstage. It wasn't trying to kill him, as Siegfried said the tiger could have killed him instantly if that was its intent, it was trying to protect him. Trainers and animals who work together for years often end up with a parent-child relationship.
Rane, how large a wild population would it take for us to let them be and have them preserve their species? If each tiger requires a territory of 600 square miles[1], and those territories would have to be contiguous for the population to meet and breed with each other, you're talking about an enormous amount of land. Even for Siberia. Even if you aren't worried about poachers. And habitat protection for an animal that doesn't have many wild members would still require a captive breeding program to come up with the animals that you want to live in the preserved habitat. I'm not saying that habitat preservation is a bad idea--especially as captive breeding merely for the sake of species continuation is, as you say, an infinitely long project. I'm just pointing out that habitat preservation for a wild tiger population is an *incredibly* costly endeavor. [1] http://www.lpzoo.com/tour/factsheets/mammals/siberian_tiger.html
#60 is an interesting explanation that I haven't heard yet. It would seem to make sense, too: an attack would have killed Roy on the spot, but if the tiger thought it was carrying a wounded family member to safety and didn't realize that teh scruff of Roy's neck was a little more tender than the average tiger cub's...
Re #61: what I couldn't find quickly is the area that would be necessary for maintaining a healthy tiger population. The articles mostly only mention an individual tiger's territory (which differ widely). But let's say it is something like 2500 square miles (of suitable habitat). That is not really enormous - Yellowstone NP is ca. 3500 square miles. Take a look at the globe - that is a little spot. The area per-se isn't the problem, but rather prior political claims to it against the world's desires to protect biodiversity. My point was that while that is expensive, it is much MORE expensive - and probably bound to fail - to maintain a captive breeding population for thousands of years.
This response has been erased.
You think they will both last thousands of years?
This response has been erased.
i hope so for the sake of my grandchildren.
This response has been erased.
/starts boiling carrots and rinsing out the mason jars i left out behind the still
#60 is the most rational adn humanistic description (coupled with teh LK show) i ahve held to reason. that the cat could extinguish a human life is not evena question. that a cat would *protect* (imstinct) a FELLOW CAT is teh only answer. that the fellow cat was a thin-skinned human is tragic - dont harm the cat. i have personally witnessed fellow-traveler-species activities many times adn instinct is overriding. granted, these were of lesser-developed species, but nontheless, the instincts *will* rule, including the energy of the 'bite'. i hope roy recovers adn has his tiger to commune with.
*hic*
Channeling Monte I am allowed to reveal that he was simply reacting to the threat of the gal in the audience with "big hair" who was seen by him to be in attack mode but in an ambiguous situation. Monte was in watch mode when Roy apparently tripped over him. Monte was in an unknown situation and responded in flight mode and grabbed the most valued item - roy- by the scruff of the neck and tried to escape. Monte attempted to remove roy from a situation that risked roy. Unfortunately roy didn't have a "scruff of the neck" which is not Monte's fault for not knowing.
Funny, Beady's channelling sounds amazingly like the newspaper articles I've been reading. I wonder how he gets it so spot-on?
I suppose this is in poor taste, but it's pretty funny: Subject: Shocking video of Roy Horn tiger attack. http://www.wnci.com/zoo/royattack.gif
This response has been erased.
<falls out of chair laughing>
This response has been erased.
Heard on the radio Friday morning: Part of Roy's skull was temporarily removed (I assume to reduce the pressure due to swelling due to the injuries inflicted). That's interesting, I guess, but it can't be swell to have one's injuries and treatments for them so publicly disseminated...
This response has been erased.
That picture is from a local Columbus radio station's site. Yup, that's WNCI for you
how tony of them .....
once, a whore bit and clawed at me, but it was just a game.
You have several choices: