Wanted to impress woman

Zookeeper films himself with lions: killed by animals

(Bild: stock.adobe.com/flashturbulence)

A tragic incident has occurred in a zoo in Uzbekistan: A zookeeper filmed himself while he was in a lion enclosure with three animals. A predator attacked the 44-year-old and he was literally mauled. The zookeeper is said to have made the video to impress his girlfriend.

The keeper is referred to in media reports as F. Iriskulov - on December 17 at 5 a.m., he went into the lions' enclosure at Parkent Zoo and recorded the encounter on his cell phone. 

In the video, the man speaks to the animals lying on the ground, who are initially unimpressed. When he shouts the name "Simba" several times, one of the animals shoots up and runs in the direction of the man, who backs away into a corner of the enclosure. The other two lions are also startled. 

The beginning of the attack is shown here: 

Video ends with the zookeeper screaming
The 44-year-old tries to calm the animal surrounding him with more shouts and pushes it away with his hand or strokes it. He then switches to selfie mode to show his face in the video. Shortly afterwards, the mood changes abruptly - one of the lions goes on the attack. The camera is still filming and you can still hear the cries of the keeper before the recording ends. 

Man was "partially eaten"
Russian media reported that the man was mauled by the big cats. An official statement said: "The lions killed him and partially ate his body." The victim's body was only found by zoo staff four hours after the attack. After the incident, two of the animals were stunned and the third was shot.

Local media reported that the animals had accidentally got into the yard because a door had been left open. The keeper had wanted to return the animals to their enclosure.