Mauled Student Climbed Under Fence to Get Rock

The chimps who viciously mauled US grad student Andrew Oberle will be allowed to live, a South African government investigator declared today. Conservationist Dries Pienaar chalked the attack up to human error on the part of Oberle, who bypassed two safety fences to get close enough to the chimps to make the attack possible, the AP reports. He says Oberle was trying to retrieve a rock he feared the chimps would throw at tourists.

Pienaar said he'd found no evidence of negligence by the Jane Goodall Institute. Oberle has undergone six hours of surgery, but remains in an induced coma, the USA Today reports. "He has to get his strength back up so they can do more surgeries," his uncle said. Reports on the extent of his injuries differ; his uncle says his limbs are in place but "ripped up," while his sister says he lost an arm, all his toes, and both his ears. (More Andrew Oberle stories.)