She joined Beekse Bergen as a 17-year-old and stayed for almost four decades. On Tuesday the safari park in the southern Netherlands announced that the keeper had died, three days after one of two male Persian leopards attacked her inside their indoor quarters.
Nobody knows exactly how the attack unfolded, because the building has no cameras. The cats had been kept indoors on Saturday because of stormy weather, a change that had been logged and passed on to staff, though it is unclear whether she knew. Badly hurt on her head and neck, she still managed to raise the alarm on her own radio. Colleagues reached her in the enclosure and a trauma helicopter took her to hospital for emergency surgery. Her condition worsened on Sunday and she did not recover.
Under park rules, keepers never share a space with the big predators. They work in pairs but enter separately, so that two doors can never be open at the same moment. The Dutch labour inspectorate opened an inquiry the same day, and the park has promised an independent investigation into how the routine broke down.
Her name has not been released, in line with Dutch privacy rules. Martin van Hees, who leads animal care at the park, described her as highly experienced and always alert to safety, and said everyone knows working with dangerous animals carries a risk. The park stayed open after consulting her family.
The leopards will not be put down. A spokesperson said they had shown natural behaviour, adding: “They are, and remain, predators.”
