Steve Irwin was born on February 22, 1962; to parents Lyn and Bob Irwin, who had a passion for rescuing and rehabilitating local wildlife. In 1970 the hobby became a full time operation, as the Irwin’s opened the Beerwah Reptile Park, later known as the Australian Zoo (Steve Irwin). Soon Steve took interest in his parents’ fascination with wildlife animals. He first learned how to catch and handle his beloved crocodiles from his father and once received a python as a birthday present (About Steve Irwin). Irwin learned many methods on how to handle such reptiles, like crocodiles, snakes, etc, without harming them; so he could later let free them in the wild or into their family park. Steve Irwin took over management of the facility in 1991. In that same year he met a lovely American, Terri Raines, on vacation from her own wildlife rehab center in the U.S. Marrying eight months later, the pair opted to go crocodile trapping for their honeymoon (Steve Irwin). While trapping crocodile on their honeymoon, it was filmed and was later made into the first episode of The Crocodile Hunter. Four years later, the series was picked up by the American cable network Animal Planet. At the peak of its popularity, the show aired in more than 200 countries (Steve Irwin Biography). In 1998 the Irwin’s introduced the world to their new family member, daughter, Bindi Sue Irwin. Then in 2003 they enlarged their family with a son, Bob Irwin. Then Steve stirred up controversy in 2004 for feeding a crocodile while holding his infant son. Many were shocked by the images of Irwin and his son Bob with the snapping crocodile and accused Irwin of child endangerment. Irwin was never charged in regard to this incident and stated that his son was never in harm's way (Steve Irwin Biography). A few months later Irwin came under criticism again; while filming a documentary Irwin allegedly broke both international and Australian federal laws by coming too close to a pod of whales and even sliding down snowy slopes with a group of penguins (Steve Irwin). Then on September 4, 2006 while filming a segment for a documentary called Ocean’s Deadliest and was pierced in the chest causing Steve to go into cardiac arrest and pass away.
We hear of shark attacks and people getting stung by jellyfish but rarely do we ever hear about a stingray attacking/stinging a person. Deaths from stingrays are rare; one US study reported 1500 stingray injuries in America each year (Macey). Stingrays have a defense mechanism to them protect them; this is known as a barb. It looks like a serrated knife and the length can vary, the sting ray that pierced Steve Irwin was around 12 inches long (Macey). The numbers of recorded stingray-related fatalities have surfaced in the media, ranging from "about 30" worldwide, to "fewer than 20," to "only 17" (Engber). These reports could and couldn’t be true because there isn’t much interest and there are hardly any attacks caused by stingray.
Steve Irwin will never be forgotten, from his catch phrase “Crikey” to educating us all on wildlife. Steve ran several organizations and contributed to many charities. “Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.” goes great with Steve Irwin because after his death many people mourned, but without Steve Irwin we would never have seen or learned so much about wildlife and the dangers they are in.
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