Daredevil Jumps Into Coppenhagen Zoo’s Polar Bear Enclosure

Zookeepers have shot a polar bear with rubber bullets after a man jumped inside its enclosure while horrified visiting schoolchildren watched on. The Lithuanian man leaped into the enclosure at Copenhagen Zoo while dozens of guests were watching the 10-year-old bear named Ivan. Zoo staffers at first yelled to distract the animal from his potential prey before others with firearms arrived, firing rubber bullets to get the huge animal to back off.

Once the bear returned to its cage, zoo employees entered the enclosure to rescue the intruder. Steffen Straede, the park manager, said the man walked over to the male bear ‘of his own free will’ but escaped with only ‘superficial wounds’.

Jacob Munkholm, a zoo spokesman, told AFP:

 He went up to the bear and it examined him by sniffing him and shoving him, and he sustained some superficial injuries. It didn’t take more than a minute-and-a-half from the alarm going off when he entered the facility until our guards… shot rubber bullets at the bear and it moved away from him.’

A group of schoolchildren who witnessed the incident were offered counselling, as were zoo staff members who were involved. The man, reportedly in his twenties, was not identified and he was taken to a hospital for treatment. According to The Local, witnesses told broadcaster DR he climbed inside to take a photograph. Police later described him as ‘mentally unstable’.

The zoo has no plans to make any changes to the enclosures following the incident today, Mr Straede added. In July 2012, Siberian tigers fatally mauled a 21-year-old Afghan-born man inside an enclosure at the same zoo. The Copenhagen Zoo also made international headlines last year when it killed a giraffe for inbreeding reasons, then dissected it and fed it to lions in front of visitors.

Source: DailyMail.Com

What do you guys think? Was the guy mentally ill or was he being a dare devil to show off for the crowd? Let us know what you think in the comments below.

-WeirdlyStrange.Com