Claim:   Photograph shows lions resting in the shade of an airplane's wing.

Status:   True.

Example:   [Collected on the Internet, 2004]

You are a South African bush pilot. You fly in some critical medical supplies, enjoy a quick lunch at the hospital. It's a stifling 100 degrees in the shade and you're eager to get back up to the cool, high blue yonder. On the way back to your plane, you discover that the only bit of shade, within 1 mile, has become very popular . . . You start calculating the distance to the plane door . . and wonder . . . "Do I feel lucky today?"

Origins:   We can't vouch that the backstory for these photographs is exactly as described above, but the pictures themselves are real. Lions will often take the opportunity to avail themselves of any source of shade (which is usually hard to come by in the savannah), and in this case even the sliver of shade provided by a small plane's wing sufficed.

The plane pictured belongs to Blue Sky Aviation, which operates out of Kenya.

Here's another picture from the same sequence:

Last updated:   23 September 2008

Urban Legends Reference Pages © 1995-2013 by Barbara and David P. Mikkelson.
This material may not be reproduced without permission.
snopes and the snopes.com logo are registered service marks of snopes.com.