Reptile & Amphibian Forums

http://www.bronxzoo.com/multimedia/headlines/reptile-house-closed.aspx

Any experienced keepers know if these guys are escape artists? I also came across a story from a few years ago about a two meter Egyptian cobra escaping a Toronto apartment building:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/story/2007/03/08/snake-sentencing.html

Being relatively thin and active makes most elapid a bit more of an escape risk than viperids for instance, but any decently constructed hot room should easily contain a snake that size (a medium sized Ramphotyphlops would have trouble getting out of mine).

The only real danger should be if it hitched a ride out in a piece of equipment or a container.

They don't mention if it was alone in it's container. If not, I would consider having any cagemates x-rayed...
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What goes up must come down...unless it exceeds escape velocity.

Just goes to show you that even the "professionals" screw up sometimes...
Drew.

Keep in mind that professional only means they receive a paycheck,it does not mean more qualified Chris

But being an AZA Institution implies you are qualified!
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Tim Cole
www.austinherpsociety.org
www.AustinReptileExpo.com/
www.AustinReptileService.net
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Conservation through Education

One would think so,it is like saying if you are a member of a construction union organized labor that you are skilled at what you do . This is not always the case. Bottom line is it can happen to any one. I know of other zoos that have had venomous snakes get loose,as well as the private sector. No organization can eliminate human error. Chris

I concur.

>>Just goes to show you that even the "professionals" screw up sometimes...

I'd go so far as to say it's premature to assume someone screwed up. We have VERY little information.
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What goes up must come down...unless it exceeds escape velocity.

I wouldn't say it's too soon to make that assumption Larry...hopefully I'm not the only one here who agrees that all venomous should be housed in escape-proof enclosures if nothing else...
Drew.

Drew,
I can assure you, the snake was enclosed in an "escape-proof" cage. We are talking about "human-error" here. i.e., someone failed to secure the snake probably after servicing the enclosure, or left one latch un-secured, and the snake, "nosed" it's way to freedom. Happens to everyone eventually, especially if you have been in this field for many years.

So then somebody did screw up. My making the point that the snake should have been in an escape proof cage was in response to Larry's comment that it was too early to assume the cobra's escape was due to human error. Your post that the snake was definetly in an escape proof enclosure proves my assumption still remians correct..."Even the "professionals screw up sometimes". That's all I was saying.
Drew.

>>Your post that the snake was definetly in an escape proof enclosure proves my assumption still remians correct...

I'm sorry, I'm not on here often enough remember who everyone is, and there are no "profiles" on this page, so I could easily be wrong, but I don't remember "texasreptiles" claiming to have been there or to have worked there before, so I'm not sure his assurance constitutes "proof". (I'm sure this will come across wrong in print.)

That being said, he SHOULD be right, because the snake should never NOT be in a secure enclosure except while being handled.

I can think of at least a few other options that we don't have enough information to rule out:

1) It was stolen by an employee (but see below).
2) A poorly designed "escape proof" cage.
3) A damaged cage.

I guess you can argue that not noticing 2) or 3) could be considered human error, but that's not what everyone meant.

Note that going back to find the original story, in case I missed anything before posting, I see that the snake has been found, presumably in the same area where it escaped (though that's not 100% clear). It's hard to get through right now, I assume because of all the people who have been following the story hitting their site at once...

Still no info about what it escaped FROM, but the following quote caught my eye:

"The difficulty was that the small snake, which is months old and weighs about 3 ounces, had sought out a secure hiding spot within the holding areas of the Reptile House – an extremely complex environment with pumps, motors, and other mechanical systems."

Personally, I would call housing venomous reptiles in such a space a poor decision. They need to be in a space with a minimum number of easily accessible hiding places.
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What goes up must come down...unless it exceeds escape velocity.

Oh, and i forgot to mention that I am was only contending that it was too early to be SURE the cause was human error. That is, of course, the most likely cause.
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What goes up must come down...unless it exceeds escape velocity.

They still are not releasing much info about where she was found, but ironically this socially networked Egyptian elapid seems to have generated a shocking amount of good will not often reserved for deadly missing snakes! I was expecting the 21st version of a 1970s horror film and instead people really took this in stride.

That being said, this still strikes me as a pretty big breakdown of procedure. My first thought was what they seem to be hinting happened, that the snake somehow nosed its way into part of the machinery running its enclosure and was able to get out of the enclosure proper but was probably stuck somewhere. Zoo professionals frequently comment that the part of many enclosures visible to the patron is often a tiny fraction of the behind-the-scenes square footage devoted to filtration, climate control, air filter, etc. My local zoo makes a point of talking about how big the machinery is to keep water turtles in clean water--many times the size of their enclosure--so that parents will realize how tough these animals are to keep as pets.

I also wondered about cobra-on-cobra cannibalism. A few years back the London Zoo kept a trio of N. haje together, a big one, a medium-sized one, and a notably smaller one, and I wondered how safe the little guy would be if the big cobras got peckish!