The last missing panda
When the earthquake happened in China’s Sichuan Province on 12 May 2008, six of the giant pandas at the Wolong Panda Centre went missing. In the days that followed, five of them returned. The sixth remained missing. Until now.
Mao Mao, the sixth panda, is home. Not this earthly home, but wherever pandas go after their journey on earth is over.
|
Her body was found on Monday, 9 June 2008. According to an Associated Press report, she was crushed by a wall of her enclosure, while a report on the Xinhuanet news site said rescuers found her body in the rubble of the pandas’ pens.
Her body was retrieved on Tuesday, 10 June, and buried the same day.
The Xinhuanet site reported that she had 3 offsprings, aged between less than 1 year and 3 years old.
“Chinese panda keeper He Changgui, center front, and his colleagues at China Conservative and Research Center for the Giant Panda mourn for panda Mao Mao which died in the May 12 earthquake at Mao Mao’s funeral in Wolong, China’s southwest Sichuan province, Tuesday, June 10, 2008. The nine-year-old Mao Mao was finally found Monday and dug out Tuesday, almost a month after the devastating earthquake, crushed by a wall of her enclosure as the river nearby swelled with landslide debris. (AP Photo/Alexander F. Yuan)”
I’d like to think that death took her quickly and she did not suffer much.
RIP, dear sweet Mao Mao.
