Search Exotic Incidents Database

A man climbed the fence to the snow leopard exhibit at the Miller Park Zoo to pat the leopard on the head. When the leopard latched onto the man’s hand, the man jerked free and sustained a 3-1/2-inch cut on his palm.

An African lion escaped from its enclosure and was found in the bed of the neighbor’s pickup truck. The lion was shot.

A man was bitten by his 5-ft-long Asiatic “pet” cobra.

An 8-ft-long, 45-lb python attacked a university lab technician when he was holding the snake, Ganja, while her cage was cleaned. The snake clamped her fangs around the man’s nose. It took five people to control the snake and work its mouth off his nose. The 24-year-old man had helped care for the snake for more than three years. The snake’s “owner” removed her from the lab and found alternate housing for her.

A man was bitten by his 8-ft-long “pet” forest cobra he kept in his bedroom.

A mountain lion at the Phoenix Zoo gashed a 5-year-old’s arm after he wandered too close to the animal’s cage and waved a stick at the animal.

A 9-ft-long “pet” python escaped from its home after being placed in the possessor’s backyard. Ten days later a neighbor spotted the snake under her window.

Two elephants with Clyde Beatty-Cole Bros. Circus became agitated and went on a rampage, triggering panic among spectators. Seven spectators were treated for minor injuries.

A 28-year-old man was bitten on his hands twice by his “pet” cobra. He was admitted to the hospital in critical condition and was on life-support equipment. Later his condition was upgraded to serious. The man had at least a dozen poisonous snakes, which he kept as “pets.”

An 8-month-old infant contracted a Salmonella infection from the family’s “pet” boa constrictor. The infant had diarrhea and other symptoms. The state’s Division of Consolidated Laboratories discovered that the Salmonella organisms in the snake’s droppings were a rare subtype of the bacterium. This was the same rare subtype recovered from the infant.