Nothing like a night under the calm, Johannesburg, South Africa, sky. This may well be what the unidentified man was thinking as he bolted past guards and through the closing gates of Kruger National Park. Whatever his reason, park rangers disagreed and immediately began a search, giving up as the grey evening slipped to black. Luckily, he was much easier to find come the morning - especially now that the lions feasting on his corpse had slowed him down a bit.

"We have no idea why he ran in," said park spokesman Raymond Travers. "No one in their right mind would run into the bush at Kruger at night." Consensus among park staffers is that the man was "mentally deranged."

Concerned the lions would have learned that humans make for easy kills, rangers shot one mid-meal and were looking for another. Travers said other people had snuck into the park at night in the past. They, too, had been eaten.

» Scott Saxon