Arts and Culture
Arts and Culture

Zoo Atlanta invests in insurance on its pandas

JULY 9, 2014, ATLANTA Giant panda twins Mei Lun (top) and Mei Huan rest in their enclosure at Zoo Atlanta, Wednesday, July 9, 2014. The zoo will be celebrating their first birthday with ceremonies starting Saturday, July 12. Born at 6:21 p.m. and 6:23 p.m. on the evening of July 15, 2013, Mei Lun and Mei Huan were the first giant pandas born in the U.S. in 2013 and are the only pair of surviving giant panda twins ever born in the U.S. The cubs are the fourth and fifth offspring of Lun Lun and Yang Yang; their older brothers, Mei Lan and Xi Lan, and older sister, Po, now reside at China's Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding. KDJOHNSON/KDJOHNSON@AJC.COM Giant panda twins Mei Lun (top) and Mei Huan rest in their enclosure at Zoo Atlanta,during their first birthday celebrations last summer. KDJOHNSON/KDJOHNSON@AJC.COM

Credit: Bo Emerson

Credit: Bo Emerson

JULY 9, 2014, ATLANTA Giant panda twins Mei Lun (top) and Mei Huan rest in their enclosure at Zoo Atlanta, Wednesday, July 9, 2014. The zoo will be celebrating their first birthday with ceremonies starting Saturday, July 12. Born at 6:21 p.m. and 6:23 p.m. on the evening of July 15, 2013, Mei Lun and Mei Huan were the first giant pandas born in the U.S. in 2013 and are the only pair of surviving giant panda twins ever born in the U.S. The cubs are the fourth and fifth offspring of Lun Lun and Yang Yang; their older brothers, Mei Lan and Xi Lan, and older sister, Po, now reside at China's Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding. KDJOHNSON/KDJOHNSON@AJC.COM Giant panda twins Mei Lun (top) and Mei Huan rest in their enclosure at Zoo Atlanta,during their first birthday celebrations last summer. KDJOHNSON/KDJOHNSON@AJC.COM
By Bo Emerson
March 14, 2015

House insurance, car insurance -- now there's panda insurance too.

Last month Zoo Atlanta took out a policy on their quartet of fuzzy bears: mom and pop pandas Lun Lun and Yang Yang and their twins, Mei Huan and Mei Lun.

The policy, with San Francisco insurer Edgewood Partners Insurance Center (EPIC), protects against theft and loss in Atlanta and during transit between the U.S. and China.

EPIC senior vice president Dan Houston, who helped write the policy, lives in Atlanta and raises horses with his wife in Canton.

Asset management company the Carlyle Group owns a majority share of EPIC, and also seems to have a thing for pandas. In 2011 Carlyle co-founder David Rubenstein donated $4.5 million to the National Zoo in Washington for panda fertility research.

Explorewww.zooatlanta.org/pandacam/

About the Author

Bo Emerson is an Atlanta native and a long-time AJC feature and news writer.

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