The three-year-old girl, who died of a gunshot wound at the Yellowstone National Park last Saturday, September 7, has finally been identified on Monday.
Yellowstone Park officials have released the little girl's name as Ella Marie Tucker, from Pocatello Ohio. Officials have, however, said that the shooting is still under investigation and have refused to release the names of the members of the girl's family, or any further details surrounding the incident. They also did not say how they thought the child managed to get her hands on the gun, which had been reported to belong to her father.
Little Ella's mother had called for help Saturday, after her daughter had apparently shot herself. Park Rangers immediately responded to the incident, but had been unable to resuscitate her. Ella was pronounced dead on the scene.
The family had been camping at the Grant Village Campground, which is located on the western shore of the Yellowstone Lake when the shooting occurred. Nobody else has been injured, and no other witnesses have surfaced to talk about what had happened. It is conveniently a time of the year when the summer tourism of the Yellowstone Park is beginning to dwindle. Statistics show that an average of 3 million people visits the national park every year, with the most common cause of death being heart attacks, more than the anticipated wild animal attack, or as this incident relates, shooting.
Yellowstone Park remains open to the general public; however the area where the shooting has taken place has been cordoned off, as Park officials are still in the process of investigating the incident.
It had been illegal to carry firearms into national parks until a federal law allowing it took effect in 2010.
Ella's death has been the first shooting-related death to occur in Yellowstone Park for 35 years. Records show that two shooting deaths were reported in 1978.
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