Giant pandas missing after earthquake
19/05/2008 5:10:18 AM
BEIJING - Three giant pandas are missing from the world's most famous panda reserve and five staff members are dead after China's devastating earthquake, an official told state media.All the pandas at the Wolong Nature Reserve were first reported safe on Tuesday, but an official with the State Forestry Administration now says three are missing, the state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.The reserve's other 60 giant pandas are safe, forestry spokesman Cao Qingyao told Xinhua.Wolong is the only place in the world where pandas, among the world's rarest animals, can be seen in such large numbers.The reserve is 29 kilometres from the epicentre of the May 12 earthquake that has killed more than 32,000 people. The government has said it expects the final death toll will surpass 50,000."We're so concerned about the entire panda community," said Suzanne Braden, director of US-based Pandas International, which supports Wolong with medical equipment and supplies."To lose anybody, whether staff, local people living around the reserve, or pandas, is devastating," she said. "These people give their lives to those pandas."As for the missing animals, Braden said, "we can hope for the best."She said the staff may be able to search for the pandas when things become more calm, or the pandas may return to the reserve on their own because it has served as their food source. But Braden also said that the pandas may be tense and fearful after the quake.The quake also destroyed or severely damaged all 32 of the reserve's panda houses, Cao said.Braden said if the pandas' or enclosures are destroyed there may be nothing to contain them, and more pandas could then go missing "unless they've been able to make some temporary adjustments." AP