NEW YORK – Corey Anderson couldn’t watch as the woman tumbled into the zoo habitat.
The Manhattan man had taken his kids to the zoo and the little ones were pointing excitedly at the silver-furred Buddy exhibit when a woman climbed the barrier to get a better look at the tiny terror, slipped and fell into the enclosure with the apex predator.
“I grabbed my kids, shielded their eyes and had just turned away,” Anderson recalled with a shudder. “The sounds…it was horrific. It sounded like enraged Elmo demolishing a plate of wings.”
Smartphone footage shot by other guests confirmed the grisly sequence. The woman landed awkwardly but was apparently unhurt as she stood and began to dust herself off, unaware of the intimidating shadow creeping up on her from behind.
“Absolute mayhem,” is the way Franz Muller described it. “Die mächtige katze! Das grauen! I have never seen ankles bleed as much as I have on this day!”
After initially shocking the uninvited guest with a swipe at her bare skin, the silver-furred Buddy proferred a single paw as if expecting something from the woman, “but when it became clear she was empty-handed, the Buddy flew into a rage and launched himself at her lower extremities,” Muller said.
Zookeepers arrived quickly amid the screams of shocked guests and held up a vacuum in warning, the footage shows. When the silver-furred Buddy hissed but showed no signs of retreating, one of the zookeepers flipped the power switch.
“The Buddy stopped, hackles raised, then bolted for the safety of his den,” said another witness, Eleni Xanthopoulou.
The victim, a 32-year-old interior designer, was rushed to an emergency medical clinic, where she was treated for “multiple lacerations to the ankles, feet and lower legs,” police said.
Bronx Zoo Officials said the silver-furred Buddy would not be punished for the attack.
“He did nothing wrong,” head carnivore keeper Ferdinand Lyle said as he cradled the deadly cat. “He’s such a good boy. Who’s a good boy? You are, aren’t you? Yes, yes, a good boy!”
