Ohio, the heart of it all

[garbon]

The zoo's barrier couldn't keep out an adventurous three year old?

Pools here have to have better fencing than that.

The barrier plus moderately attentive parents kept kids out for decades.

The fact that an accident never happened before doesn't mean the thing is inherently safe, though. Unless this particular three year old had budding superpowers, the fact that he could get through it is a pretty good indication it wasn't good enough.

Canadians always trying to come up in here and tell us how to run our zoos. This is America! Freedom, bitch!

[Caliga]

The fact that an accident never happened before doesn't mean the thing is inherently safe, though. Unless this particular three year old had budding superpowers, the fact that he could get through it is a pretty good indication it wasn't good enough.

We should have let a Canadian test the barrier.  For example, that Toronto lawyer who liked to throw himself at high-rise plate glass windows to show off for his interns.  He would have done a good job of QCing that barrier.

[derspiess]

Yeah, I guess we should just put the animals back in steel cages.

Anywho, this infographic thingie shows what the barrier was like at the part of the exhibit where the kid climbed over. 

[11B4V]

So, Big H saved the kid and got shot for it.

[Admiral Yi]

That looks like a pretty standard barrier.

[Barrister]

zoo enclosures are designed to keep the animals in, not to keep people out.

[Malthus]

zoo enclosures are designed to keep the animals in, not to keep people out.

The barrier wasn't designed to keep people out, but to keep people from falling into the moat designed to keep the gorillas in.

Zoos design barriers for at least three reasons: keep animals in; to keep people from harming the animals; to keep people from harming themselves or being harmed by animals. 

[Malthus]

Yeah, I guess we should just put the animals back in steel cages.

Anywho, this infographic thingie shows what the barrier was like at the part of the exhibit where the kid climbed over. 

Infographic is wrong in a couple of ways, allegedly.

(1) Kid is 3, not 4.

(2) Kid managed to crawl through the fence, not hop over it (allegedly).

It is hard to see how a 3 year old could get over a properly designed 3 foot fence, but it is worth noting that fencing around public and private pools usually has to be 4' and impossible to climb (no "ladder effect" allowed). I had an occasion to look into this years ago for an unrelated reason ...

[alfred russel]

Infographic is wrong in a couple of ways, allegedly.

(1) Kid is 3, not 4.

(2) Kid managed to crawl through the fence, not hop over it (allegedly).

It is hard to see how a 3 year old could get over a properly designed 3 foot fence, but it is worth noting that fencing around public and private pools usually has to be 4' and impossible to climb (no "ladder effect" allowed). I had an occasion to look into this years ago for an unrelated reason ...

While that may be, if you pay attention to the barriers around major falls--on the upper decks or concourses of stadiums, frequently traveled parts of national parks with cliffs (accessible by car and thus children), I don't think that is out of line. The difference between a pool and the other examples is that kids want to get into a pool. Most kids don't want to go over the edge of cliffs. Though apparently this one did.

[Malthus]

While that may be, if you pay attention to the barriers around major falls--on the upper decks or concourses of stadiums, frequently traveled parts of national parks with cliffs (accessible by car and thus children), I don't think that is out of line. The difference between a pool and the other examples is that kids want to get into a pool. Most kids don't want to go over the edge of cliffs. Though apparently this one did.

I would say a zoo is more akin to a pool than a national park or a stadium, in that a zoo is (1) an attraction specifically intended and advertised to draw very young children in large numbers, and (2) contains lots of potential man-made hazards.

Obviously, one would not expect a national park to have the same level of protection on cliffs and the like - too intrusive and expensive, and people understand national parks are not kiddie attractions. It is a more 'use at your own risk' kind of place.

Zoos, OTOH, anticipate and prepare for children. Most have facilities designed for that, including things like a "lost children pavilion" - because they know, with large crowds, where you are expected to wander from exhibit to exhibit, it is reasonably foreseeable that a certain number of kids will, with a moment's inattention, drift away from a parent's custody.

This is less likely at (say) a stadium, where people typically stay in assigned seating.

Given that it is reasonably foreseeable that a certain percentage of kids will wander from parental oversight, and given that it is an attraction specifically marketed to young kids (among others), it makes sense that the relevant standard of care would require them to have in place barriers that can defeat a 3 year old where there are open hazards, like a 15' fall into the gorilla pit.   

[derspiess]

You're underestimating what kids can get into.  My nephew in Costa Rica was climbing trees when he was three.

[Malthus]

You're underestimating what kids can get into.  My nephew in Costa Rica was climbing trees when he was three.

At least here in Canada, we are capable of developing fences toddlers can't climb. If you in the backwards US are nice, we will even share that advanced tech with you. 

Indeed, they are mandated in the Toronto bylaw concerning private pools, with a definition of what constitutes "non climbable" by young kids.

[Valmy]

Yes lets mandate expensive new wall requirements because one kid in Ohio did something. We'll make Canada pay for it.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Greetings from the Canadians, our words are backed with unclimbable fencing.

[Malthus]

Yes lets mandate expensive new wall requirements because one kid in Ohio did something. We'll make Canada pay for it.

So expensive that every private pool owner in this city can afford them around their entire pools, but evidently large zoos in the US can't afford them across their gorilla habitats.  I guess it is true about the sad decline of the states ...