Flying tigers over Vietnam with CV alive

Four endangered Indochinese tigers were transported from their origin in the Czech Republic to Luxembourg and then onwards to a new home in Vietnam by Cargolux for exhibition in the Hanoi Zoo.

The tigers were carried on a Cargolux 747 freighter via “CV alive,” the carrier’s live cargo transportation service. Over the years, Cargolux has transported a wide range of exotic animals, including giraffes, alpacas, white tigers and white rhinos. In this instance, the tigers were kept in a carefully ventilated and temperature-controlled environment that the airline says can replicate any natural environment from 4˚C to 29˚C.

With fewer than 350 animals in this extremely rare subspecies currently alive in the wilderness of Southeast Asia, and another 20 registered in captivity, the endangered Indochinese tiger population has been diminished by protracted regional conflicts in the past. More recently, the population has been reduced by 70 percent by urbanization and agricultural activity in the last decade, according to the World Wildlife Fund.

The Hanoi Zoo today has a tiger breeding program to help save the animals from extinction, but the zoo had come under scrutiny in 2008 when it had admitted to illegally selling dead tigers to animal traffickers. Although the tigers were reported to have died of natural causes, their remains should have been cremated under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, that Vietnam signed onto in 1994 to protect the endangered big cats.