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more about the first story from www.3rdrecon.org/tiger.htm A man-eating tiger was killed by members of a small recon patrol when the 400 pound cat attacked a 3rd Reconnaissance Battalion Marine in the northwestern corner of South Vietnam... The tiger, measuring at least nine feet from head to tail was transported to the 3rd Reconnaissance Battalion headquarters. After examining the huge beast, MajGen. Raymond G. Davis, Commanding General, 3rd Marine Division and Assistant Division Commander, BrigGen. Robert B. Carney, Jr., congratulated the reconnaissance team for killing the animal. It is believed to be the same animal that killed a Marine earlier in the vicinity of Fire Support Base Alpine. Also on hand to examine the beast, now very still and hanging from a ten foot scaffold was Phan Van Sang, a professional Vietnamese tiger hunter, who had participated in a tiger hunt, organized following the first tiger incident six weeks before. Sang told the Marines that he had killed five tigers in his 20 years of hunting, but that he had never seen one as large as the man-eating cat. He expressed the belief that the tiger might very well be the same cat that attacked the other Marine. He explained that large cats usually work only in pairs and tend to hunt in the same area. For the recon team, it was a memorable experience, marred only by the injury to one of its members. But as they looked at the strung-up 400 pound man eater, they knew that this tiger would never attack another Marine. note: The injured Marine was Richard P. Goolden who was medically retired as a result of the attack. |