The St. Louis Zoo is mourning the loss of a member of their family, a 23-year-old orangutan named Robert B.
Robert B, a Sumatran orangutan, died Wednesday morning due to complications associated with an air sac and respiratory tract infection, the Zoo said in a press release.
The median life-span Sumatran orangutans is 28.2 years, according to the Association Zoos and Aquariums reference library of scientifically valid median life expectancies. Robert would have turned 24 on July 29.
Robert moved into the Fragile Forest in 2011. He was born at Sedgwik County Zoo in Wichita, Kan., and also lived in the Topeka Zoo and the Rolling Hills Safari Park in Salina, Kan.
Four other oragnutans can still be seen at the St. Louis Zoo, Merah and her daughters Ginger and Rubih as well as Cinta, a male.
“From the moment Robert B came to the Saint Louis Zoo five years ago, he quickly became a favorite of visitors whom he greeted regularly at the windows in his indoor and outdoor habitats,” said Jack Grisham, vice president of Animal Collections at the Saint Louis Zoo.
Our viewers have reached out with some of their pictures of Robert B.
