Incredibly sad loss of stingrays

[Coryluv]

This just hit the news here:

54 stingrays dead after habitat malfunction at Brookfield Zoo - Chicago Tribune

 

[Reefer James]

Lack of oxygen????? How hard would it of been of them to agitate that water before it even became a problem..

There's something else not being told. Someones loosing their job and possibly going to jail lol..

 

[Coryluv]

Lack of oxygen????? How hard would it of been of them to agitate that water before it even became a problem..

There's something else not being told. Someones loosing their job and possibly going to jail lol..

I don't know. There are not enough details to be able to say how it happened, just what happened.

This reminded me of all the folks here who have suffered losses after some kind of malfunction/mishap. When keeping a small, closed environment that is dependent on life support, things can go wrong, even for the pros who do it full time. I'm looking at my display tank right now, grateful it is running and that everyone is swimming.

 

[Reefer James]

The pros set-up redundancies and have spares on-site haha. Richard Ross @ the Steinhart Aquarium comes to mind as a pro at setting up an aquarium.

 

[coralbandit]

This is very sad!
I agree something else is going/went on.
54 fish in 1 1/2 hours screams way more then low O2.
How could the system bottom out so fast?
The pros don't wonder what they need,they get what they need X2!
People are allowed to stick their hands in the water at this exibit,and who knows what else?
I have a hard time buying the low o2?

 

[sinibotia]

I work with pro systems in aquaculture research. No way this would have happened here. Three times daily system checks and two different sources of O2- one from the building itself, one from a separate air tank. Only way this happened is someone screwed up bad.

 

[Brookster123]

Contaminate of sorts? Sounds like poisoning..

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[Coryluv]

Human error? Poisoning? I just don't know.

When I call the folks in charge at the zoo pros, I mean they are marine biologists and veterinarians.

Someone may or may not have made a mistake. It could have been a system fault, maintenance, or system design error. It could have been sabotage like intentional poisoning.

The analogy I draw is an airplane crash. Commercial aviation is conducted by highly trained professionals and still there are accidents. Some are human error. Some are mechanical or maintenance errors. Some are design errors and some have been brought about by malevolence.

Until there is an investigation who can say? All I know is that I feel very sad about it.

P.S. In aviation accident prevention training, there is a concept called "hazardous attitudes". One of them is called "invulnerability" and is characterized by "it won't happen to me". Just saying....

 

[fish wrangler]

Chiller malfunction would explain the low oxygen levels and the death after the alarms where off.

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[Reefer James]

Chiller malfunction would explain the low oxygen levels and the death after the alarms where off.

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That was my chain of thought. Stingrays are COLD water animals... Most likely they fried to death and it was easy enough to say oxygen because it does technically decrease with heat.

 

[fish wrangler]

That was my chain of thought. Stingrays are COLD water animals... Most likely they fried to death and it was easy enough to say oxygen because it does technically decrease with heat.

When my mom told me about this earlier today I thought the exact same thing.
The report also said the exhibit had a heater malfunction back in 2008 killing 14 rays.

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