Animal lover Jenna Donley paid for her passion

Jenna OGrady Donley

Animal lover … Jenna Donley.
Source: Supplied





JENNA Donley was among the best and brightest of her class – a devoted and talented veterinarian due to graduate with first class honours next week.


Now family and friends are in mourning after Ms Donley was gored to death by a pygmy elephant in Malaysia.

Ms Donley, 25, was trekking with a friend and a local guide in the Tabin Wildlife Reserve in Sabah state, on the Malaysian part of the island of Borneo, when the attack occurred about 8.30am on Wednesday. It is believed the animal may have been startled when the women started photographing it.

Ms Donley died instantly but her friend and the guide were not injured.

Her mother Liz Donley yesterday described her only child’s death as a “very tragic accident”.

VIDEO – elephant kills NSW woman Jenna Donley

She said the women would have been respectful of the animal’s environment.

“Bull elephants are fast, they can move with unpredictability, and they’re aggressive and they’re protective,” she told ABC radio.

“This was an animal by itself and they startled it.

“This is an accident that has happened, a very tragic accident.”

Ms Donley, who called herself Janet O’Grady Donley on her Facebook site, had a keen interest in large animals and volunteered in Africa to help injured animals at a wildlife sanctuary. She recently completed a thesis on renal failure in big cats.

One of the young vet’s university internship supervisors, Edla Arzey, said she had great potential.

“She was a very talented student, she was full of life, full of adventure, and this is what got her into trouble,” Ms Arzey said.

Professor Rosanne Taylor, dean of Sydney University’s faculty of veterinary science, said Jenna was a dean’s list prize winner and future leader of the profession. “She was very much the face of Australian veterinarians of the future – dedicated, hard-working, driven by research. She will be very much missed,” Prof Taylor said.

 

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