Tiger kills 1, injures 2 in San Francisco

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 25 (UPI) -- One person was killed and two others seriously injured Tuesday when a tiger escaped its enclosure at the San Francisco Zoo and attacked them.

The tiger was shot and killed by police who arrived at the scene as the attack unfolded, CNN reported.

The two surviving victims were rushed to San Francisco General Hospital with life-threatening injuries, the network reported.

"Apparently, right around closing time -- there was a pen with four tigers in it -- one of the tigers got out," Mindy Talmadge, a spokeswoman for the city fire department, told CNN. "The tiger went into a cafe at the zoo and attacked a patron. That person ended up dying at the scene."

Talmadge said the zoo was locked down afterward and all animals were accounted for, including the three other tigers in the same enclosure with the escaped tiger. It was not clear whether the cat that escaped was one of the zoo's Siberian tigers or a Sumatran tiger.

Last year, one of the zoo's Siberian tigers attacked a keeper during a public feeding. The keeper recovered from her injuries.