This has to be the understatement of the year.  

story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=583&e=3&u=/nm/20040916/od_nm/people_roy_tiger_dc

Magician Says Tiger Bite Was Bid to Help Him

BERLIN (Reuters) - A Las Vegas-based magician who was mauled and dragged from the stage by his white tiger during a show last October said in an interview to be aired Thursday that the animal was actually trying to help him.

Speaking to German broadcaster RTL, German-born Roy Horn said the tiger, called "Montecore," was trying to stop him from falling over on stage after he suffered a dizzy spell.

"It was an accident. Montecore understood the signals and wanted to save me," the illusionist-animal trainer said, adding: "It was unfortunate that his teeth hit my carotid artery."  

Horn, who performed glitzy shows with white tigers and his partner Siegfried Fischbacher, insisted Montecore not be destroyed and has already visited the animal since his release from hospital just before Christmas.

Horn was clinically dead for about a minute and told RTL about the experience: "I saw flashing bright lights and my mother. My beloved animals were lying at her feet."

He had a simple explanation for his brush with death on his 59th birthday: "I was not allowed to die just yet, because my wings for being an angel were not quite ready."

DUPE.

understatement indeed but somehow not grin-inducing in any way, shape or form

is there really anything that funny about the incident??

You can take the cat out of the jungle, but you can't take the jungle out of the cat.  

GOOD KITTY!!!