Beastly Behavior: Animal Attacks
Actually, most wild animals that are predators or carnivores attack as part of their wild nature. The same holds true for protective attacks from species considered “docile” by most people, such as deer. Deer actually attack tons of people every year. USA Today printed this article, Deer Attacks: Civilization Locks Horns with Nature.
Find the Bureau of Labor Statistics Chart of Animal Attack Fatalities here or search for the latest data once on the site. (The new data does not seem to have been pulled out but animal attack fatality summaries through 2002 is listed in this PDF under “Assaults and violent acts” (page 4) and (page 12) Under “Persons, plants, animals, and minerals.”
What the media missed in their stories surrounding why animals attack is that recent research has found that captive animals also suffer from post traumatic stress disorder.
During my career, and highlighted in my last assignment with elephants, I theorized that animals with unstable backgrounds, inconsistency in handling, and other similar contributing factors were more inclined to be fearful or aggressive. Recent research is now correlating that theory.
Elephant research has attributed instability to something akin to post traumatic stress syndrome as discussed by Charles Seibert in his article that appeared in the New York Times titled, An Elephant Crackup? (https://www.arkanimals.com will publish in an article in January related to this topic.)
Although more and more wild animals are being born in captivity and do not fall into this category, there are still many wild caught animals who witnessed the slaughter of their kin and who may have been traumatized by other such human activities.
Obviously, the answers are not so simple and determining just what the cause was for the attack on Ken Peters, the orca trainer has not been identified. Minor altercations with both wild and domestic animals occur regularly and trainers must always be in top form physically and mentally to deal with wild animal charges.
This topic might be a good idea for a scientific rather than a sensationalized special.
