Big cat put down after vicious attack on sanctuary owner

The British owner of a wildlife sanctuary in South Africa has been severely mauled by a lion he handreared from a cub in an attack that was witnessed and filmed by his tourist customers.

Michael Hodge, 71, was attacked as he walked into the enclosure of the Marakele Animal Sanctuary’s star attraction, a male lion named Shamba.

Video footage of Saturday’s incident shows Hodge, who moved to South Africa in 1999, walking in a relaxed manner towards the lion as a ranger outside the fence attempts to distract the animal.

Hodge, who founded the sanctuary in Limpopo with his wife Chrissy and stepdaughter Emma in 2010, was reportedly investigating a strange smell that had been upsetting the lion.

Suddenly, Hodge is seen running for the gate of Shamba’s enclosure, before being brought down by the lion, his body crashing against the fence.

A woman can be heard sobbing and screaming “Oh my God!” and “Somebody help, please!” as the lion drags Hodge away into a thicket.

Hodge is heard to cry out “Help me, please!”

Shots ring out, fired by the ranger, prompting Shamba to drop the injured Hodge.

The lion retreated a few metres from the bush where the Briton lay, but not far enough to allow a safe rescue attempt to be made.

Shamba was then killed, a family friend, Bernadette Maguire, said, before Hodge was rushed to a clinic in Thabazimbi. He was later airlifted to a hospital in Johannesburg.

His wife said her husband had been hurt but was now recovering.
“He has a broken jaw and several lacerations, but is recovering well,” she said. The family were devastated over Shamba’s death, she said. The lion, born in 2008, had been hand-reared since it was a month old, with Hodge nursing it through a near-fatal dose of colic, according to friends.

Shamba was one of the most popular of the dozen or so big cats housed in the sanctuary’s predator park.

Tourists could pay an extra fee to be locked into a cage on the back of a pickup vehicle.

Shamba had been trained to leap on to the cage to eat freshly slaughtered chickens hung from the bars.

Tourists would then photograph Shamba from just a metre away as the feathers flew.

“Come and take a ride on the wild side in our purpose-built Lion Mobile,” the sanctuary’s website reads. “I can promise you that Shamba will jump up and look you in the eye.”

Previous visitors and volunteers said Hodge had long experience with lions, having hand-reared three from cubs.

One, a lioness named Nina, even slept on his bed, according to Emerita Abadilla, a former volunteer.

“She slept in Mike’s bed, washing his face and giving him a spit-bath daily at 3am,” she wrote in a blog post two years ago.

Apart from lions, the sanctuary also housed at least two tigers.

Some visitors to the sanctuary’s Facebook page criticised the manner in which Shamba was killed and the park run.

But friends also came to Hodge’s defence, saying he had a special bond with the dead lion.