A tiger forced out of its pen and mauled a zoo worker to death Sunday in Laizhou city of east China's Shandong Province, zoo officials and hospital sources confirmed on Monday.

Witnesses say the tiger escaped from its pen at around 5:00 PM and seized the zookeeper by his neck. "We all started yelling, partly in fright and partly with hopes to distract the tiger's attention on its prey," said a witness who declined to be named. "Zoo officials came instantly and drove the tiger away."

The zoo keeper was sent to the People's Hospital in Laizhou but died shortly from serious injuries on the trachea, said one of the doctors who treated him.

Investigation into the accident is underway.

The tragedy came merely a week after an eight-year-old boy was killed by two tigers at a privately run zoo in Changde, central China's Hunan Province. The tigers pounced on the boy through the bars of their cage when he climbed up a one-meter high fence for a better view. Management of the zoo has agreed to pay the boy's family 350,000 yuan (US$42,200) in compensation.

(Xinhua News Agency April 18, 2005)