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Critters

Elephants escape Shrine circus in St. Louis and damage cars

I have spent considerable time building a list of negative incidents associated with circus elephants in the United States since 1800. Thanks to Google’s newspaper archive, I’m discovering several more to add to what is already a large list.

Of course, sometimes the incidents happen in real time.

Three circus elephants got loose and damaged two cars in the parking lot of the Family Arena on Saturday afternoon before being corralled by trainers, according to the circus’ sponsor.

Dennis Kelley, president of the Moolah Shriners of Eastern Missouri, which has been sponsoring the Moolah Shrine Circus for decades, said the incident happened during a performance about 5 p.m. He said no people were in the parking lot when the elephants somehow escaped from the back of the arena in St. Charles. The elephants roamed an area of the parking lot where only circus and Shriners employees’ cars were parked.

Two cars were damaged, he said.

Circus elephants damage cars during brief escape in Family Arena parking lot

According to Fox News, four vehicles were damaged.

And now the story has been picked up by the Washington Post, which noted that the venue’s loading door was also damaged.

Yes, I think we can assume the USDA is quickly coming to investigate the Royal Hannaford’s elephant handling. The Royal Hannaford is the actual circus contracted by the Shriners, and this is not the Royal Hannaford’s first incident.

KMOV notes the elephants were from the children’s rides. “Officials confirmed these are the elephants children can ride, however, no children were on the elephants when they got loose.”

Elephants have hurt handlers, children, and adults when used for rides. It would be safer to send your kids out into a busy street to play.

CNN has video of the elephants in the lot, and eye witness accounts. Note that this wasn’t a simple case of elephants just wandering out of their enclosure—evidently they panicked during a performance. This was a potentially extremely dangerous situation, which the circus is attempting to downplay. I expect severe repercussions from the USDA.

CNN story

Circuses haven’t been good for elephants, and forcing them to perform in circuses hasn’t always been that great for people, either.

PDF of the Elephant Incident List

Categories
Critters Environment

Go Vegan!

In comments to a story at Food Safety News, (Report: ‘Bycatch’ Blamed for Nine Dirty Ocean Fisheries Off U.S. Shores), about the distressing amount of bycatch associated with several fisheries, a commenter to the story wrote:

Even if bycatch could be ended, which it won’t be, fishing would still remain a horrific agony for the billions of fish who are intentionally caught. Science has shown fish to be sentient: able to suffer terror and pain. All for a food that presents such hazards to human consumers as concentrated mercury, dioxins, PCBs and other toxins, cholesterol, saturated fat, etc.

There is a bounty of humane and far more healthful and environmentally responsible food choices. This includes the many marvelous vegan seafood options that are convenient, affordable and delicious. Recipes, products and more can be found on the Vegan Seafood Resources page of Fish Feel.

I noted the response was irrelevant to the story. “Not so!” was the reply.

My response:

While we’re waiting for the utopian world where people sit side by side with lions and tigers, and all only eat fruit that gently falls out of the tree on its own, we need to face the problems associated with our food supply today.

I have a hint for you: the world is not going to become vegan overnight. I doubt it will become vegan in the next several decades–if ever.

So we can either ignore all problems unless the solution is premised on “Go Vegan!”, or we can look to do better, one step at a time.

Doing better in regards to seafood means a) eliminating bycatch, c) ensuring a healthy ocean environment, and c) preventing overfishing. This particular story is related to the issue of eliminating bycatch.

While it is true “Going vegan” is a solution…it’s not going to happen. It isn’t. Oh, maybe for a small percentage of people, but not the vast majority of humans. Not today. Not this moment.

So, according to you, there is no solution other than Go Vegan. One then presumes your argument is let 65% of the bycatch die for no reason. Let sharks and sea turtles and other marine life just die for no reason, because if people aren’t willing to go vegan, we don’t care.

Because, “Go vegan!” is all that matters

I know several vegetarians and vegans who understand that, though going vegan is a solution, it can’t be the only solution we offer. If “Go Vegan!” is the only solution we’re willing to contemplate, we’re condemning domestic livestock to a miserable life, millions of sea creatures to an unnecessary death, and other wildlife to predation by humans who see them only as “target” or “nuisance”.