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American Morning
What Caused the Attack on Roy Horn?
Aired October 06, 2003 - 08:15 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, ANCHOR: As illusionist Roy Horn fights for his life in a Las Vegas hospital, there are questions about whether the famed Siegfried and Roy act will ever be seen again.
Horn was mauled by a tiger during a show on Friday night. He's in critical condition. And Miguel Marquez is in Las Vegas for us this morning with the latest on that.
Miguel, good morning.
MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Soledad.
Guarded optimism is what we're hearing out of folks close to him. They're saying that simply because Roy Horn is communicating with them, though they're not saying what form of communication that is.
As you know, he was attacked on Friday night. You're looking at video shot a year ago of the part of the show about 45 minutes in when the seven-year-old Siberian white tiger named Montecore attacked Roy. It was supposed to lay down on cue when he drops the leash. It didn't. It turned on him and then bit his neck.
His long-time manager, Bernie Yuman, says for Roy Horn it is a minute-to-minute struggle.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BERNIE YUMAN, ROY HORN'S MANAGER: Roy's condition now at this moment, literally embarking on the beginning of the third day, is stable. That brings us cautious optimism. He is, indeed, critical.
MARQUEZ: Do you think he's embarking on the way to a recovery?
YUMAN: Every minute of every hour of every day that passes helps us get closer to where we want to be. Insofar as the recovery process is concerned.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MARQUEZ: And that seems to be all they're focused on right now, the recovery. The show has been canceled indefinitely. Over 200 employees told over the weekend that they should look for other career options -- Soledad.
O'BRIEN: All right. Miguel Marquez for us in Las Vegas this morning. Thanks for that update. Siegfried and Roy have done more than 30,000 live performances with their trained tigers. So what could have gone wrong in this show?
Joining us this morning from the Bush Wildlife Sanctuary in Jupiter, Florida, is Jack Hanna. He, of course, is the host of "Jack Hanna's Animal Adventures." He's also the director emeritus of the Columbus, Ohio, zoo.
Hey, Jack, it's nice to see you. Thanks for joining us. And good morning.
JACK HANNA, HOST, "JACK HANNA'S ANIMAL ADVENTURES": Morning.
O'BRIEN: I see you have a little cougar there with you, a baby. I can't really tell how old that cougar is. But give me a sense of -- are you basically saying that these animals, like the tigers, like your little cougar there, eventually cannot ever really truly 100 percent be tamed?
HANNA: Well, Dr. Williams said it well. He said usually you can train a wild animal and never tame a wild animal. Now I tell people that a wild animal is like a loaded gun. It can go off at any time.
Now the cougar here is the largest cat on the North American continent. And when they make a kill, they're a very powerful cat. They can take down elk, large deer. So you can imagine how powerful a cat it is.
And of course, every cat has a different killing ability. The cougar usually jumps on the neck like the tiger does. A jaguar from South America breaks the skull. The African lion breaks the back. A cheetah suffocates its prey by the esophagus. So every cat has a different killing ability.
And of course, the tiger, not knowing -- I wasn't there at the time of what happened out in Las Vegas. But obviously the tiger -- I've seen a tiger take down a 2,000-pound water buffalo in India in less than 30 seconds. And you can imagine the power of that animal.
So whatever made him upset, he did what he did naturally. And of course he took Roy off on the way he came on, thank goodness, and went behind the stage with him.
O'BRIEN: Is there any sense that Roy Horn made a mistake? We've heard from witnesses that the tiger was supposed to lie down on a certain cue, did not lie down. So maybe he tapped it or something on the nose. I guess it was described as sort of to get the tiger's attention.
HANNA: Right.
O'BRIEN: Any indications that he didn't know what he was doing, that he made a mistake?
HANNA: I wouldn't say that, you know, these guys are the best in the world. You know, just tapping him on the nose, maybe the tiger got his arms, from what I understand and tapped him and the tiger didn't let go, and he tapped him again, and the tiger didn't let go. And just -- you never know what happened in the tiger's mind. And the tiger did, as I said before, what comes naturally.
I wasn't there. So I don't think -- somebody said the lights, the cameras, whatever, might be -- obviously, the tiger had been there many times. So to me, that wasn't it.
A trainer can feel an animal. A trainer -- Even in the zoological world, where we work and here at the Bush Wildlife Sanctuary, when you -- you can feel what animals want and what they don't want. And maybe he felt -- Roy felt that the animal was a little uneasy or something was going on when he didn't obey his command there. And of course you saw what happened. When it happens, it happens like a gunshot. It's quick.
O'BRIEN: Now, these tigers are raised in captivity. So one would sort of think that they would be more docile and less wild than those that were raised, were somehow brought in from the wild. Is that not accurate?
HANNA: Well, they're not necessarily the world "docile." They're a trained, highly precision animal, obviously. You know, you've got to remember that this animal was to make a kill for food, like what we see in the wild when we film in our television series. When that happens, it's like bam. I mean, there's no waiting around.
This animal wasn't, you know, upset or killing -- I mean, it wasn't killing for food or anything like that, or I'm sure for a fact that Roy wouldn't be here.
The animal was -- somehow something upset him. You never know. You know, it's like a racecar driver that might drive for 30 years and have that one accident.
What happened was, you know, they have a tremendous record. They've educated 30 something million people over the last 30 years about the tiger. And so they've done a tremendous job in doing that.
What happened here is what happens. And you know, all of us know in the field that we're in that we work with wild animals. We do the best we can to respect that and respect that animal and his feelings, and obviously something happened that night and it went wrong.
O'BRIEN: Yes. It certainly did. And of course, we're all hoping for the best for his recovery there.
Jack Hanna, as always, nice to see you. Thanks for joining us this morning. Appreciate it.
HANNA: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired October 6, 2003 - 08:15 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, ANCHOR: As illusionist Roy Horn fights for his life in a Las Vegas hospital, there are questions about whether the famed Siegfried and Roy act will ever be seen again.
Horn was mauled by a tiger during a show on Friday night. He's in critical condition. And Miguel Marquez is in Las Vegas for us this morning with the latest on that.
Miguel, good morning.
MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Soledad.
Guarded optimism is what we're hearing out of folks close to him. They're saying that simply because Roy Horn is communicating with them, though they're not saying what form of communication that is.
As you know, he was attacked on Friday night. You're looking at video shot a year ago of the part of the show about 45 minutes in when the seven-year-old Siberian white tiger named Montecore attacked Roy. It was supposed to lay down on cue when he drops the leash. It didn't. It turned on him and then bit his neck.
His long-time manager, Bernie Yuman, says for Roy Horn it is a minute-to-minute struggle.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BERNIE YUMAN, ROY HORN'S MANAGER: Roy's condition now at this moment, literally embarking on the beginning of the third day, is stable. That brings us cautious optimism. He is, indeed, critical.
MARQUEZ: Do you think he's embarking on the way to a recovery?
YUMAN: Every minute of every hour of every day that passes helps us get closer to where we want to be. Insofar as the recovery process is concerned.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MARQUEZ: And that seems to be all they're focused on right now, the recovery. The show has been canceled indefinitely. Over 200 employees told over the weekend that they should look for other career options -- Soledad.
O'BRIEN: All right. Miguel Marquez for us in Las Vegas this morning. Thanks for that update. Siegfried and Roy have done more than 30,000 live performances with their trained tigers. So what could have gone wrong in this show?
Joining us this morning from the Bush Wildlife Sanctuary in Jupiter, Florida, is Jack Hanna. He, of course, is the host of "Jack Hanna's Animal Adventures." He's also the director emeritus of the Columbus, Ohio, zoo.
Hey, Jack, it's nice to see you. Thanks for joining us. And good morning.
JACK HANNA, HOST, "JACK HANNA'S ANIMAL ADVENTURES": Morning.
O'BRIEN: I see you have a little cougar there with you, a baby. I can't really tell how old that cougar is. But give me a sense of -- are you basically saying that these animals, like the tigers, like your little cougar there, eventually cannot ever really truly 100 percent be tamed?
HANNA: Well, Dr. Williams said it well. He said usually you can train a wild animal and never tame a wild animal. Now I tell people that a wild animal is like a loaded gun. It can go off at any time.
Now the cougar here is the largest cat on the North American continent. And when they make a kill, they're a very powerful cat. They can take down elk, large deer. So you can imagine how powerful a cat it is.
And of course, every cat has a different killing ability. The cougar usually jumps on the neck like the tiger does. A jaguar from South America breaks the skull. The African lion breaks the back. A cheetah suffocates its prey by the esophagus. So every cat has a different killing ability.
And of course, the tiger, not knowing -- I wasn't there at the time of what happened out in Las Vegas. But obviously the tiger -- I've seen a tiger take down a 2,000-pound water buffalo in India in less than 30 seconds. And you can imagine the power of that animal.
So whatever made him upset, he did what he did naturally. And of course he took Roy off on the way he came on, thank goodness, and went behind the stage with him.
O'BRIEN: Is there any sense that Roy Horn made a mistake? We've heard from witnesses that the tiger was supposed to lie down on a certain cue, did not lie down. So maybe he tapped it or something on the nose. I guess it was described as sort of to get the tiger's attention.
HANNA: Right.
O'BRIEN: Any indications that he didn't know what he was doing, that he made a mistake?
HANNA: I wouldn't say that, you know, these guys are the best in the world. You know, just tapping him on the nose, maybe the tiger got his arms, from what I understand and tapped him and the tiger didn't let go, and he tapped him again, and the tiger didn't let go. And just -- you never know what happened in the tiger's mind. And the tiger did, as I said before, what comes naturally.
I wasn't there. So I don't think -- somebody said the lights, the cameras, whatever, might be -- obviously, the tiger had been there many times. So to me, that wasn't it.
A trainer can feel an animal. A trainer -- Even in the zoological world, where we work and here at the Bush Wildlife Sanctuary, when you -- you can feel what animals want and what they don't want. And maybe he felt -- Roy felt that the animal was a little uneasy or something was going on when he didn't obey his command there. And of course you saw what happened. When it happens, it happens like a gunshot. It's quick.
O'BRIEN: Now, these tigers are raised in captivity. So one would sort of think that they would be more docile and less wild than those that were raised, were somehow brought in from the wild. Is that not accurate?
HANNA: Well, they're not necessarily the world "docile." They're a trained, highly precision animal, obviously. You know, you've got to remember that this animal was to make a kill for food, like what we see in the wild when we film in our television series. When that happens, it's like bam. I mean, there's no waiting around.
This animal wasn't, you know, upset or killing -- I mean, it wasn't killing for food or anything like that, or I'm sure for a fact that Roy wouldn't be here.
The animal was -- somehow something upset him. You never know. You know, it's like a racecar driver that might drive for 30 years and have that one accident.
What happened was, you know, they have a tremendous record. They've educated 30 something million people over the last 30 years about the tiger. And so they've done a tremendous job in doing that.
What happened here is what happens. And you know, all of us know in the field that we're in that we work with wild animals. We do the best we can to respect that and respect that animal and his feelings, and obviously something happened that night and it went wrong.
O'BRIEN: Yes. It certainly did. And of course, we're all hoping for the best for his recovery there.
Jack Hanna, as always, nice to see you. Thanks for joining us this morning. Appreciate it.
HANNA: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
