A Giant Panda died after succumbing to gases being used to disinfect a nearby air raid shelter. Quan Quan, a 21 year old Giant Panda, died after rescue personnel tried unsuccessfully to revive her. She had been taken to the hospital but was unable to be saved.

WASHINGTON - AUGUST 30: Giant panda cub Tai Shan sits and chews on grass in the morning at the Giant Panda Habitat at the Smithsonian National Zoological Park August 30, 2006 in Washington, DC. Weighing more than 62 pounds, Tai Shan (who?s name means ?peaceful mountain? in Chinese) turned one-year-old on July 9, 2006 and has helped draw an estimated 1.2 million visitors to the habitat since his December 2005 debut. The new $10 million Fujifilm Giant Panda Habitat is scheduled to open Sept. 20, 2006 and will be a state-of-the-art research facility and add more than 12,000 square feet to the pandas' outdoor exhibit. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Officials at the Jinan Zoo in China say that the ventilation system they have at the zoo is shared with the old air raid shelter. Quan Quan was considered a national treasure of sorts in China. During her 21 years she had given birth to 7 Panda cubs.

Zoo officials had moved the Giant Panda indoors to protect her from the heat; ironically that’s what eventually killed her as Quan Quan was gassed to death. An autopsy on the animal showed that her lungs collapsed from inhaling a mixture of Chlorine, Chlorine Hydride and Carbon Monoxide.

Animal rights activists are already up in arms about the whole purpose of breeding the animals in captivity. My argument to that is you can’t have it both ways. Giant Pandas are an endangered species with only about 1,000 living in the world. If you stopped breeding them in captivity how long would it be before the Giant Pandas died out? Quan Quan died at the ripe old age of 70 in Panda years.