Recently, three leopards escaped from Hangzhou Wildlife World, and the park had no choice but to admit to the accident until about a week later, arguing that the reason for the cover-up was “fear of causing panic”. The way it was handled triggered public condemnation.
On May 8, several topics related to the escape of the three leopards hit the Weibo hot search list. On May 1, a tea farmer “stumbled upon” a leopard in the tea mountains near Longmenkan Village in Hangzhou’s Qiantang Street and took photos of it; on the 6th, a local resident reported to the Qiantang police station that he had also seen the animal suspected of being a leopard.
On the evening of the 7th, another resident reported to the police that a suspected leopard had been spotted in the Golden Garden Villa of Shoujiansilian Village, Yinhu Street, Fuyang District, Hangzhou; however, according to local media reports on the same day, the staff of Hangzhou Wild Animal World denied that “an animal had escaped from the zoo”.
On the morning of the 8th, the animal world suddenly issued a closure announcement, saying that “security problems in the park need to be dealt with and maintained in a timely manner”, and soon after, the announcement was deleted.
The “leopard infestation” was so confusing that the local community was in an uproar until the afternoon of the 8th, when the official microblogging site of the Fuyang authorities, “Fuyang Release”, issued a notice identifying three immature leopards that had escaped from the animal world, one of which had been recovered at the time.
The company then issued an “apology statement”, claiming that “in the early stages, because of the weak aggressiveness of the escaped juvenile leopards and fear that the announcement of the incident would cause panic, the relevant information was not released in time.”
The park’s handling of the incident sparked condemnation from the mainland media and netizens.
The New Beijing News published an opinion piece saying that the key to reducing panic is to keep information as transparent as possible. The zoo’s management’s “miraculous operation” is not only inconsistent, but the denial of key information at the beginning has greatly increased the risk factor for residents.
The article also pointed out that the escaped leopard is a fierce animal even if it is not an adult, and there is a possibility of attacking and hurting people. It is the zoo’s legal responsibility to release information in a timely manner and alert the public to safety. The fact that the information was not reported is tantamount to “accident concealment”.
“Red Star News” is of the view that the zoo is a “fluke than fear”, “to deceive the public response, it is outrageous”.
There are also netizens sarcastically said, “the management thinks ‘preventable and controllable’ it”, “this trick is not our ZF (government) used to it”, “something happened It is difficult to conceal the escape of the leopard before admitting it”.
The second leopard was also captured at 5 p.m. on the 8th after a dragnet search by professionals. At first, there is news that the leopard has been surrounded and bitten by search and rescue dogs, the online video also shows that multiple search and rescue dogs will surround and bite it, the filmmaker and the search and rescue personnel present said, “leopard, bite dead.” But the leopard suddenly struggled again, the scene personnel immediately panicked under the command: “Bite up! Bite up!”
At 6 p.m., CCTV debunked the rumor that the second leopard was not dead, but only captured by anesthesia.
As of this writing, the third leopard is still being searched for.
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