..Kansas Woman Discovers Circus Tiger in Bathroom..

By Matt PeckhamApril 23, 2013
Time News Feed


 What’s the wildest thing you’ve encountered in a public bathroom? Broken toilet? Spent cherry bomb? A person who was obviously confused by the gender symbols on the bathroom door? Tiger?


Wait, tiger? Yes, tiger, as Jenna Krehbiel of Salina, Kan. discovered upon visiting the ladies room at the Isis Shrine Circus this weekend. Krehbiel had just finished watching the circus’ big cat show and stepped away to use the facilities at the Salina Bicentennial Centennial Center when she came face to face with a massive feline.
“I went in to use the bathroom, and a lady came in to get her daughter out and said there was a tiger loose,” Krehbiel, who was a first-time visitor to the circus,  told the Salina Journal. “I didn’t know it was in the bathroom, and I walked in the (open) door, which closed right after I had walked in. I saw the tiger; it was at most two feet in front of me, and I turned around calmly and walked back toward the door.”
The tiger had escaped at some point during the show, according to Center officials, prompting staffers to lock down the area, but the roughly 25-foot-long bathroom apparently had more than one entrance — Krehbiel came in from the other side, putting her “the closest [she'd] ever been to a tiger not in a cage.”
She told the Journal that while the tiger wasn’t the biggest in the show, she estimated it was at least 250 pounds. Why then didn’t she panic and flee abruptly? Because of her training as a social worker, she told the Journal, which keeps her “always on alert.”
And her three-year-old daughter’s reaction after Krehbiel relayed what happened? Hygiene first: ”[She] wanted to know if it had washed its hands,” said Krehbiel. “That was her only concern.”