Siegfried&Roy

[jiacinto]

What did the lion do? Why did it attack? Wasn't it used to Siegfried by now and didn't it know him since it was a baby? Why did it attack him?

[Skittles]

1. um

because, regardless of anything and everything, a tiger is STILL A WILD ANIMAL.

[THUNDER HANDS]

2. i think he hit it with a microphone

that's what I heard. But I don't really follow tabloid stories.

[Wonk]

3. http://news.google.com/news?q=Siegfried+Roy

http://news.google.com/news?q=Siegfried+Roy

[mrbill]

4. have you ever had a cat?

think it was a tiger not a lion........

[inthecorneroverhere]

15. I'm glad that mine weigh 1/6 or less of what I weigh....

Nice, furry, and soft as they are, if my kitties were my size, they would not have been invited to my home.

Have one kitty who is perfectly nice to me, but takes swipes at other people sometimes. The other two are active mousers.

[charlie]

5. Roy, not Siegfried

"The white Siberian has been a cooperative cat. But on Friday night, he didn't want to walk in the right direction. So Roy hit him on the cheek with his microphone five times.

After the fifth time, the tiger, which weighs about 600 pounds, attacked. The animal grabbed at Horn's arm, causing the entertainer to stumble.

The tiger then lunged at Horn, who tried to beat the animal away with the microphone. It bit into the left side of Horn's neck and dragged him off stage by the neck. The attack barely missed severing Horn's carotid artery."

http://www.wftv.com/news/2533576/detail.html

[Avalon Sparks]

8. Just wanted to clarify...

I've been following this story closely, and I've read information on CNN, ABCnews.com, The Las Vegas Review Journal, Yahoo News, MSNBC, and even The Dallas Morning News, and EVERY article I've read said that the Tiger grabbed onto Roy's arm when Roy was trying to get it to obey a command to lie down. Roy then began hitting the Tiger on the head with his microphone, and then the Tiger lunged at Roy, grabbed him by the neck and then dragged him off the stage. The crew and trainers were able to get the Tiger off of Roy by spraying it with a fire extenquisher. (sp?)

Roy lost a lot of blood, had surgery to his neck Friday night, and then suffered a stroke the next day, and had to be rushed into surgery to decrease pressure on his brain.

Since he has hung on this long, doctors are guardly optimistic. He has been on a ventilater, but he was showing signs of responding to communication. Today he slowly gave the two thumbs up sign when the doctors asked him too.

The show has been cancelled indefinitely. The Mirage is going to try and help the 267 member cast find jobs.

On the way to the hospital Roy is said to have asked that no harm come to the Tiger, Roy said it wasn't the Tiger's fault.

I personally think Roy panicked and hit the Tiger on the head after it grabbed his arm. Apparently after 35 years, he's never been hurt by one of the Tigers, so I think he probably panicked, even though he should have always expected it, I guess.

I really like S&R and have become a fan over the years. I was really bummed out about this over the weekend, and I'm wishing good karma and a speedy recovery to Roy.

[AmandaRuth]

6. may daughter, the cat expert

my daughter, who fancies herself a cat expert, says that hitting a cat in the face is about the most insulting thing you can do to a cat. For what its worth anyway.

[inthecorneroverhere]

16. yep

House cats really don't like being boinked (tapped) in the face. If they're submissive, they'll buckle under, but if they're 'proud,' they might hiss or scratch.

Boinking kitty in the face is an aggressive last-resort means of establishing dominance.

Normally, people are 'boss' to cats simply because they're taller and larger than the cat. With a tiger, training the tiger not to be the dominant 'top cat' is a LOT harder, because the tiger is bigger than the person!

[Fridays Child]

17. That goes for dogs and humans, too.

It's humiliating.

[Wolfman 11]

7. because he is gay

I saw it on FoxNews.

[roguevalley]

9. the cat was off his feed and roy miscalculated

he tappe, not hit him. Its a training tool. unfortunately, the cat wasn't in the mood. they are very proud animals, cats. the first thing that roy said when he came to was 'don't kill the tiger'.

Poor guy. I wish him well. After 30,000 performances without a
scratch, this sucks. Nice tigers. Love them. Own one? Nah.

[FlemingsGhost]

18. 30,000 performances? I'm surprised it didn't happen sooner.

Proof of Roy's extraordinary talent, I'd say.

Still, tigers belong in the wild. Not on a stage, or behind bars.

[U2Fanatic]

11. LOL

[Kahuna]

10. Why don't you ask the lion. How should we know why he..

attacked? :P

[pansypoo53219]

12. frankly,

considering that if the tiger had WANTED to kill Roy, he could have done it in seconds. If anything, he was showing Roy who is really boss and did what a 'cat' would do with a cub, grabbed Roy by the scruff of the neck. I say the tiger was a good kitty with a large ego. (actually 8 is probably an adolescent tiger).

[dofus]

13. What it really comes down to is that tigers

can be tamed, but they're still wild animals. They are not domesticated. That applies to lions also, but the animal in question was a tiger. Yeah, a trainer knows what he's doing, and these guys have worked with these animals for many years, but there's still a certain risk. But I do hope he recovers, and I do hope the tiger who attacked him is simply pensioned off and gets to live his life out in some wildlife preserve.

[WilliamPitt]

14. It basically tore his throat out

It grabbed his arm, he swatted it with his microphone, and then it went for his throat and dragged him offstage by the neck.

His last words, apparently, were "Don't kill the cat."

[opihimoimoi]

19. Mrs Murphy sez "Sooner or Later"

Go Sox