The red panda was only three months old and choked on the vomit caused by the stress of the noise.
Keepers at Edinburgh Zoo in Scotland revealed on Friday that a baby red panda died from the stress caused by fireworks in the city during Bonfire Night celebrations.
According to Ben Supple, deputy chief executive of the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland (RZSS), the red panda was just three months old and choked on the vomit caused by the stress of the noise.
“Roxie recently lost her mother Ginger, but she was responding well to the expert care of our team of specialists and was feeding independently,” he explained. “Unfortunately, she choked on her vomit on bonfire night and our vets believe it was probably a reaction to the fireworks.”
Bonfire Night, also known as Guy Fawkes Night, is celebrated on November 5th to commemorate a failed plot to blow up the British parliament in 1605.
During the celebrations, in which bonfires and fireworks are lit, “Roxie had access to her den, but the frightening noises seem to have been too much for her”.
“We know that fireworks can cause stress to other zoo animals and we can't rule out that they may have contributed to the untimely death of Roxie's mother, Ginger, just five days earlier [during the Halloween celebrations],” he added.
The Royal Zoological Society of Scotland has started a petition calling for tighter restrictions on the use of fireworks and has called for a ban on their sale and for public light-only pyrotechnic shows. The document has already been signed by over a million people and delivered to the office of the British Prime Minister, Keir Starmer.
