Could a hippos surive a shot from a shotgun?

Answer 1

Absolutely.

If one wanted to meet an unfortunate end at the hands of a large, and angry hippo one could simply shoot said animal with birdshot. About the only way the hippo would die would be if it contracted a deadly infection from the birdshot wounds, a fate it would not face until long after having had the chance to show the shooter the correct way to kill something.

Now if one were to take larger size buckshot, or slugs into the equation the question becomes much less certain. A well-aimed slug could quite likely cause a fatal wound, large buckshot could inflict enough trauma for the animal to bleed to death. In any case however death is unlikely to be quick or humane to the animal and poorly aimed shots even with the best slugs could easily result in simply maiming the animal rather than killing it.

So in any case, yes survival is possible. How likely it is however is a question with too many factors to give a simple answer.