The death of Simon, the 10-month-old, three-foot-long bunny who was on track to become the world’s largest rabbit, continues to mystify. Yesterday, it was announced the Simon did not survive his United flight from England, as his owner Annette Edwards was sending him to Chicago to a new home with an unnamed but “very famous” owner. Today, it has ben revealed in The Guardian, The Sun, and elsewhere that Simon did in fact survive the flight, and then was taken to an pet facility run by the airline, according to United spokesman Charles Hobart. “But shortly after,” says The New York Post, “the rabbit was found dead when an employee opened its cage.”
As United squelches one fire today, a new one arises: What happened to Simon in that room? As luck would have it, United CEO Oscar Munoz had an interview today with NBC’s Lester Holt, where, true to his foot-in-the-mouth PR style, he unwisely compared losing a pet to losing luggage: “We are deeply sorry for the loss of anything from your luggage to, of course, a loved pet.”
According to Hobart, Annette Edwards has refused the airline’s offer of a necropsy. She is instead trying to get Simon’s corpse flown back to England so she can have him examined by a vet for probable cause of death, although she is complaining on Twitter about United’s lack of responsiveness:
.@MailOnline I am so very sad I need United Airlines to get back to me, I wont to know why
— Annette Edwards (@maycats56) April 27, 2017
In further news, Edwards apparently takes her rabbit involvement extremely seriously: She’s not only an ex-Playboy bunny, but, The Sun reports, once had plastic surgery to look more like the animated Jessica Rabbit. We still feel bad for poor Simon, but the world of rabbit trafficking is filled with more intrigue than we ever could have imagined.