Newlyweds Bindi Irwin and Chandler Powell were forced to cancel their honeymoon to help with Australia Zoo’s $400,000 weekly payroll crisis amid the COVID-19 pandemic
Newlyweds Bindi Irwin and Chandler Powell were forced to cancel their honeymoon in March as the coronavirus pandemic threatened their family financially.
One day after their wedding, the family held a meeting to discuss how to keep late Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin’s legacy alive on ‘skeleton staffing’.
In an Animal Planet special set to air in August, titled ‘Crikey! It’s the Irwins: Life in Lockdown’, the couple will discuss how they addressed Australia Zoo’s $400,000 per week payroll crisis.
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Newlyweds Bindi Irwin and Chandler Powell (left) were forced to cancel their honeymoon in March to help with Australia Zoo’s financial woes amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Pictured with Terri and Robert Irwin at Australia Zoo
Bindi and Chandler made the ‘difficult decision’ to host their wedding at Australia Zoo on March 25 without guests amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The couple got engaged at Australia Zoo in Queensland in July last year, on what was Bindi’s 21st birthday. They began dating in 2015.
Bindi’s mother Terri Irwin was filmed addressing the problems Australia Zoo faced amid COVID-19 in the upcoming TV special.
She claimed that the zoo’s usual payroll per week was $400,000, which accounted for 52 per cent of their income.
‘The pandemic has severely affected Australia Zoo financially… I can’t even come close to paying bills. We’re having to stand down staff and it’s very emotional,’ Terri says in the episode.
‘I can’t even come close to paying bills’: Terri Irwin (left) claimed they had to stand down staff at Australia Zoo as they struggled financially with the zoo’s usual $400,000 weekly payroll
At-home honeymoon: Bindi and Chandler forfeited their honeymoon plans to help keep Australia Zoo operational on ‘skeleton staff’. Pictured: Bindi and Chandler on their wedding day at Australia Zoo on March 25
Bindi and Chandler forfeited their honeymoon plans to keep the zoo operational on ‘skeleton staff’.
‘We had originally planned to do a road trip for our honeymoon,’ Bindi says on the TC special, but claimed that quickly changed as they had to spend it in lockdown at the Queensland facility tending to the 1,200 animals.
The TV special will document the Irwin family’s time in lockdown at Australia Zoo.
‘We had originally planned to do a road trip for our honeymoon’: Bindi and Chandler spent their honeymoon in lockdown at the Queensland zoo tending to 1,200 animals
‘Our honeymoon may not have turned out as we’d planned, but we’re grateful to be spending time with our beautiful animals,’ Bindi wrote on her Instagram in May.
‘Things are incredibly busy here while we’re temporarily not open. We’re all working together to make sure our animal family is happy,’ she added at the time.
Australia Zoo reopened to the public with social-distancing measures in place earlier this month on June 12.
Bindi and Chandler’s TV wedding special aired for Australian fans on May 23 on Foxtel’s Animal Planet after it premiered on US cable channel Animal Planet in April.
Crikey! It’s the Irwins: Life in Lockdown will air on Foxtel’s Animal Planet on Saturday, August 1 from 7:30pm
Tune in: Crikey! It’s the Irwins: Life in Lockdown will air on Foxtel’s Animal Planet on Saturday, August 1 from 7:30pm