UPDATE:
The mystery as to how an exhibit at the Palm Beach Zoo flooded, killing two bush dogs, is now solved.
There’s a pool inside the exhibit, designed to keep the bush dogs cool. Sunday night, an employee went to fill it up, but forgot to turn it off. The water was left running for 5-6 hours.
The bush dog exhibit is now closed indefinitely. There is still no sign of Lily and Carino, the two bush dogs who are presumed dead.
“We are looking at this, we are looking at all avenues of this. We still have two dogs that we don’t know where they are inside the habitat,” says zoo spokeswoman Naki Carter. She vowed that a deadly mistake like this wouldn’t happen again at the zoo. “We are making modifications now.”
Those modifications include an overflow drain and security features on the waterline.
It’s the second human error related fatal accident at the zoo since April last year. A state and federal investigation said experienced keeper Stacy Konweiser violated safety rules by entering a tiger night house with a tiger inside. The tiger mauled her. The zoo was not cited in that incident.
"Anyone who knows the zoo and knows the staff that works here, we take what we do, we take conservation and our mission to preserve wildlife so seriously, we are so passionate about that," Carter said. "But we are coming together stronger and to make sure nothing like this ever happens again."
The zoo would not comment on the employment status of the person responsible for leaving the water running.
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ORIGINAL STORY:
The Palm Beach Zoo said Thursday that two bush dogs are presumed dead following a flooding in their habitat. But without confirmation, the zoo is not ruling out the possibility that they are still alive, and although unlikely, possibly outside of their exhibit.
“They are one of a few mammal species at the zoo that burrows, and when water started rising in their home, they likely went underground where they sleep,” said Jan Steele, the zoo’s director of wildlife care and conservation.
The incident was discovered early Monday when zookeepers performed a routine check on the animals. Naki Carter, spokeswoman for the zoo, in an exclusive interview with WPTV, said the cause of the flooding is under internal investigation. She said outside agencies are assisting.
The zoo is not ruling out a broken pipe or human error. Carter said she would share the results of the investigation with WPTV which is active and ongoing. The West Palm Beach area received very little rain Sunday.
“We immediately pumped out all the water in the habitat and excavated every burrow. Basically, after an entire day of digging, we were unable to dig any deeper without putting the infrastructure of the habitat in jeopardy,” Jan Steele, the zoo’s director of wildlife care and conservation said in a statement.
According to a news release, zoo officials combed the habitat and surrounding fences for holes and tufts or scratch marks that could indicate the dogs tried to climb a fence.
Crews from Gast Construction Group also assisted with the search.
“Understandably, the zoo staff is heartbroken. They have worked long and hard to develop relationships with these dogs and the loss is devastating," Steele said.
Zoo officials contacted Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission and officials with USDA to report the presumed deaths and ongoing investigation, said the zoo.
“Given how skittish the dogs were when we didn’t find them in initial searches, we set food out their favorite food items to see if they would come out with no one around," Steele said.
Both bush dogs, Lily and Carino, had individual identification microchips, but zoo officials said that to read the chip you must be within a foot of the animal and they were unable to get close during excavations of the habitat.
Bush dogs are an endangered species that are both skilled diggers and swimmers. Their toes are webbed. They are natives of South America.