Watch as escaped kangaroo fights team of police officers trying to rescue it in Canada
A young kangaroo in Canada escaped from a zoo and embarked on a three-day-long adventure that culminated in a fight with a team of police officers, officials said and a video shows.
The kangaroo was being transferred between zoos when its handlers stopped at the Oshawa Zoo and Fun Farm on the night of Thursday, Nov. 30, Canadian news outlet CP24 out of Toronto reported.
“It was just supposed to be a stopover, like a hotel room, on (the kangaroo’s) way to Quebec,” Cameron Preyde, the Oshawa Zoo supervisor, told the outlet. But the kangaroo escaped its handlers.
“It jumped over their heads,” Preyde told CP24.
The kangaroo was spotted nearby but evaded search and rescue efforts for three days, the Durham Regional Police said in a Dec. 5 news release.
A team of police officers tracked down the escaped kangaroo Dec. 4 and snuck up behind it, officials said in a news release that day.
Video footage shared on YouTube shows the tumultuous rescue effort from a police officer’s body camera.
At first, the kangaroo seemed peaceful. Suddenly, it jumps up and knocks into an officer. The video goes black, and a crashing sound can be heard.
Officers manage to get a hold of the kangaroo by grabbing its tail as it fights back and tries to get away, the video shows. The animal struggles with the officers for several minutes.
Finally, police got the feisty kangaroo loaded into a vehicle, the video shows.
Officers said they returned the escapee to the zoo, where the animal is expected to make a full recovery.
Preyde told CTV News on Dec. 4 that the kangaroo is “resting, she is warm, she is well-fed, she has got fresh water and I think she is much happier now than she was over the past few days.”
Zoo officials have not named the kangaroo. Durham Regional Police made the kangaroo an “honorary member of the K9 Unit” and named it “Police Service ‘Roo’ Emy May” based on the names of the officers who rescued it, according to the Dec. 5 news release.
A photo shared by Durham Regional Police on Facebook shows two officers with the young kangaroo.
Oshawa is in Ontario and about 35 miles northeast of Toronto.
This story was originally published December 6, 2023 at 11:40 AM with the headline "Watch as escaped kangaroo fights team of police officers trying to rescue it in Canada."
