In the summer of 1996, something incredible happened at Brookfield Zoo in Illinois. A 3-year-old boy accidentally fell 25 feet into a gorilla enclosure and was seriously injured. Onlookers gasped. His mother cried out. Fear filled the air. With seven gorillas in the area, everyone expected the worst.

But something remarkable followed.

Binti Jua, a 350-pound western lowland gorilla and a devoted mother, calmly stepped in. She carried her own baby on her back but focused her attention on the unconscious boy. Binti gently approached him, picked him up with surprising care, and walked over to the enc

Thanks to her protective actions, the boy was safely rescued and taken to the hospital.