Image: CCTV / Gizmodo

A group of tigers is called an “ambush” for a reason. When these massive cats get together and decide to catch some prey, they’re simply vicious. A quadcopter learned this the hard way at a Siberian tiger enclosure in China’s Heilongjiang Province. Not only did the beasts swipe the drone out of the sky—they took a few bites of the poor gadget.


China Central Television (CCTV) caught the incident on camera as reporters were trying to grab some aerial footage of the Siberian tigers romping in the snow. The drone appears to be a DJI Inspire, normally a very stable drone, with a modified battery strapped to the back. But it only took one mistake for the quadcopter to fly low enough for one of the tigers to get a claw in there, bring it to the ground, and start gnawing on the carbon fiber frame.

Let’s just hope none of those endangered tigers took a bite out of that big battery pack.


Update 6:47 pm: According to Motherboard, the tigers in this video are found in the Harbin Siberian Tiger Park, which has previously come under fire from animal rights activists for its allegedly poor treatment of the animals.

[CCTV]