British teacher attacked by lion on safari
By Sophie Borland
Last Updated: 1:50am GMT 04/02/2008


A young primary school teacher has told how she narrowly escaped with her life after she was savagely mauled by a lion on an African safari trip.


Kate Drew, 28, was pounced on from behind by the 28st animal as she walked through an enclosed area of the Zimbabwe game reserve and knocked over.

She was pinned to the ground as the lion sank its huge teeth into the back of her head, leaving her screaming in terror.

But armed park rangers who were leading the tour saved her life by wrestling the creature away from her prone body and rushing her to get medical help.

Miss Drew was driven to a nearby clinic where doctors treated her wounds with 30 stitches. She had suffered three deep cuts to her head, one of which came close to the lower part of her brain.

Recalling her ordeal back in England, she said: "We were in a place where they breed lions to put them back into the wild.

"I was a bit apprehensive but we were just leaving and everything seemed to have gone well until this one lion jumped at me from behind.

"I was scared enough when he pinned me on the ground so when I looked up and saw two more coming towards me I thought 'oh my God I'm a-goner.'"

Miss Drew added: "Luckily for me he was only playing otherwise I would not be here to tell the tale."

It is thought her long blonde hair confused the lion, who mistook her for a playmate.

It is not known how many people fall prey to lion attacks but in the neighbouring country of Tanzania there have been reports of more than 100 every year.

The attack happened last month while Miss Drew, from Hornchurch, Essex, was on a "walk with lions" tour which offers visitors the opportunity to stroke and pet animals in an area specially set aside for breeding.

Miss Drew, a teacher at Ardleigh Green Road Junior School, Hornchurch, had paid £24 for the experience as part of a three-week long trip through Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi and Kenya.

She did not tell her parents about the attack until she had returned home last week.

Her mother Carole Drew, 57, a teaching assistant, said: "She was terrified. She said she had been walking along, they had actually been stroking the lions, and they were getting close to the gate at the end when a lion leapt up and knocked her to the ground.

"It had her on the floor and bit the back of her head. She said it was very painful, she was screaming.

"She almost passed out because she couldn't believe it was happening."

Mrs Drew added: "We didn't find out what had happened until she got back, she didn't want to worry us.

"We picked her from the airport and she said "I suppose I'd better tell you, I got bitten by a lion', I couldn't believe it, if I'd have known I'd have flown straight out there."

Her father Colin Drew, a retired oil trader, added: "I was obviously a bit shocked that she had been so close to coming completely unstuck.

"We always urge her to take care but she is an extremely adventurous woman. Hopefully this will be a wake-up call for her."

Miss Drew had booked the tour having completed three months' voluntary work as a primary school teacher in Tanzania for the charity Village Action.

She had been teaching English to more than 100 young children in the impoverished area of Yamba, in the Tanga region to the north of the country.

Miss Drew has now recovered from the lion attack and has flown to Peru to spend two months with Village Africa teaching children in an orphanage.

The lion was thought to be a juvenile male cub aged about one year old.

The "walk with lions" tour takes place through an enclosed area of the game reserve that has been set aside for the breeding of cubs.

The lions are relatively tame and are used to being petted and stroked by visitors who pass through every day.

Caroline Drew, Kate Drew's mother, said that park rangers had told her daughter that an attack like this had never happened before.

"Walk With Lions"????????

Holy Crap. WHo actually gets to market this junk. I can get the crap sued out of me for neglegence when some retard slips on his own drink in my store but apparently "bunny hugger" operations must be liability free if they are convincing dim-whitted women they can walk with lions.

After careful reading of the title to this thread I am puzzled as to what a lion was doing on safari in the first place?

(Sorry...I've spent too many years editing stuff)

It seems like a great idea! Lets breed wild lions to re-release into the wild, but in the mean time lets see if we can lead groups of people into their territory to pet them. After all a lion is nothing but an oversized housecat, right?

At Vic Falls there was a group advertising a "walk with lions". Brochure showed some family with lions on there laps.

Of course there was also a Cape Buffalo walking around downtown. Between that and the street vendors I felt safer in the bush.

Crazy.

a blond in a cat house - Hmmmmm

I used to take clients to walk with (juvenile)lions at a private reserve near Hoedspruit...many came back with torn trousers and bloody scratches.

I would not contemplate this with adult lions and random people together...

Told this to my blonde adult daughter. Her reply was, "Dad, this isn't another blonde joke is it?"

quote:

Originally posted by stubbleduck47:
After careful reading of the title to this thread I am puzzled as to what a lion was doing on safari in the first place?

(Sorry...I've spent too many years editing stuff)

Yea, a walk through a breeding zoo ain't a safari.

JPK

She must have quite the blond mane to be confused as the lion's playmate.

quote:

She was pinned to the ground as the lion sank its huge teeth into the back of her head, leaving her screaming in terror.

Isn't that the way Lions kill small Apes and Monkeys?

quote:

Miss Drew added: "Luckily for me he was only playing otherwise I would not be here to tell the tale."

Only playing. How naive can some people be?

Do you know why the lion bit her?


Because it's a lion!

The attack happened last month while Miss Drew, from Hornchurch, Essex, was on a "walk with lions" tour which offers visitors the opportunity to stroke and pet animals in an area specially set aside for breeding.

What a bunch of freakin' morons!

Stubbleduck47:

I had the exact same reaction when I read the title of the thread.

Dave

Sigried and Roy had the very same explanation as to why the tiger that bit Roy's neck and head and nearly killed him did so: It did not mean him any harm, but may have just been protecting him. Yes, Moron is the correct designation.

I think that it is probably ok to 'walk' with lions that have been hand-reared and are up to 8-10 months old. If you associate with a lion that has not been familiar with you as a cub and any older than a year is risky business I would think! At the end of the day it is still a wild animal and sometimes it is the ones that have no fear of humans that are the most dangerous!

A few years back I was on a guided night drive in the Kruger...There was about 6 of us in the back of an open Land Crusier and the guide/driver was quite happy to to drive us "into" a pride of lions..

We literally had lions walking around us within a yard or two...Everybody else was standing up and taking pics (with flash) while I was busy trying to look small and inedible!

The driver didn't even have a rifle with him..As most of the lions in the Kruger are probably maneaters, it was the most incredibly stupid thing I've ever seen done...

No matter what you might say about Kate, she is incredibly kind and cares for unfortunate people to the point of endangering herself. Give her some credit already. I am sure she has and or will encounter many things/people on her travels much more dangerous than that young cat. Hell, I would be more afraid to walk most big city streets after dark...never mind what might get me in the dark in Africa...or on any wildlife tour. You want to see real wild life thats dangerous...walk thru just about anywhere in LA or DC after dark. I think she is a tremendously brave and intelligent...not stupid, person. Just too bad there are not more people wanting to do good things for these desperate people.

quote:

think she is a tremendously brave and intelligent...not stupid, person. Just too bad there are not more people wanting to do good things for these desperate people.

I guess volunteering as a teacher in Tanzania is a noble venture. Could she have done it without getting into a cage with lions? That, after all, is the stupid part.

quote:

It is thought her long blonde hair confused the lion, who mistook her for a playmate.

I think a lot of old men get equally confused.

lions, being cats can be unpredictable and vary very much in temperament from animal to animal. I have been 'mauled' by a boisterous 4 month old male lion cub that weighed around 70kg (about my own body weight) and belive me, they can be very rough and powerfull! I think that playing with a cub any larger than that and you would be biting off more than you could possibly chew. If the cat was playing, which it may well have been, they do not know their own strength, as they play with their siblings who are of their own size and strength usually, and that being a lot tougher than any human. Being pounced on by a year old cub is hardly any different to being smacked by an adult lion, and cats can get a bit silly and excited too when playing, and can draw blood, which is never good! I think that it is important to remember that even tame lions still have the natural hunting/killing instict in them and they could probably also get a bit confused sometimes when playing about whether they are playing with their food or with a play-mate, as it is an un-natural situation.

I think this is just how evolution works.

Here in the UK we have a significant urban population who study "Greenpeace Monthly" all year and take a two week holiday in Scotland, or some other rural area where the people are backward and engage in quaint customs, where they spend their time pointing at things they want banned. Usually they also have some fantastic ideas for how the people, who have just had the means to making a living banned, could live more fulfilling sustainable lifestyles in mud huts with no water or electricity.

After such successful missions to put things right in the country most of the urban nutter faction retire to teaching etho-social anthropology with disabled lesbian studies in some inner city university. However, a proportion go on to attempt to save the world by spreading their sustainable message to peasants in other countries who know no better. The people of Africa must be over the moon to have the Greenpeace lesson of the day read out to them while they starve because they can't kill for meat or die of malaria because they can't use DDT as the Greenpeace bible says it is bad for you.

However, as can be seen from this report, what "Greenpeace Monthly" fails to mention is that if you are sufficiently downright stupid and lacking in common sense to believe the crap they pump out then you are also a prime candidate for experiencing the full effects of evolution. In the end the fluffy bunny animals will do as they have always done and now they are helped by the green nutters who have told their loyal followers that the fluffy bunny animals are their friends. From the perspective of a lion a "walk with lions" must look like a fast food takeaway and long may it remain so.