WOLONG, China — Nearly a month after she was crushed to death when China’s devastating earthquake collapsed the wall of her enclosure, 9-year-old Mao Mao was laid to rest Tuesday in a quiet corner of the Wolong panda-breeding center as her keepers wept.
The facility was badly damaged by the May 12 quake, but officials initially thought all 64 pandas had survived. Then they discovered two were missing. Mao Mao’s body was discovered Monday, buried under debris.
The loss of the panda, a mother of five, was a blow to the breeding program at Wolong, which continues to struggle to recover. The quake was centered just 20 miles away in the heart of Sichuan province’s mountainous panda country, and five Wolong staff members were killed.
The endangered panda is revered as a national symbol in China, where about 1,600 pandas live in the wild, mostly in Sichuan and the neighboring province of Shaanxi. Another 180 have been bred in captivity.
For the staff at Wolong, Mao Mao’s loss was acute because she was killed in her prime, said David Wildt, who heads the Center for Species Survival at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo in Washington.
“I don’t think it’s surprising there’s a great deal of concern over the loss of this animal,” said Wildt, who has worked closely with the Chinese panda program for more than a decade. “The people who work at Wolong are completely dedicated to those animals. Most of the animals have been born there. The way they are raised, they are handled a great deal. People get to know these animals. They’re all named and have their own personalities.”
More than 69,000 people were killed by the quake. Wedged in a narrow valley a few hours’ drive from the capital of Sichuan province, Wolong was pummeled by landslides on both sides.
