BABOONS WRECKED SUBURBAN PANTRY

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30511, 5 August 1964, Page 1

BABOONS WRECKED SUBURBAN PANTRY

(New Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, August 4.

A baboon was killed and two others, which invaded a suburban homes are now back in their cages after a spectacular escape from Wellington zoo today.

The baboons roamed around Newtown before two of them broke into the home of Mrs I. E. Adams and caused havoc in her pantry.

A tranquilliser gun, fired through a hole drilled in the pantry door, eventually knocked out the escaped baboons after police and zoo staff had spent two hours trying to capture them.

At 11.30 a.m. the freedom of two of the baboons in the pantry ended when they became unconscious. They were then loaded on to a truck and returned to their cage.

The third baboon, trapped in a tree, became dangerous and was shot. For Mr K. Kuiper, assistant to the director of the Wellington Zoo the incident began when he looked out of his office window and saw the three baboons walk by. One animal was trapped in a garage temporarily, but the other two crossed Newtown Park and moved

down Russell terrace to Mrs Adams’s house in Angus avenue.

Mrs Adams said she was hanging out the washing when she was distracted by a scrabbling noise at a fence behind her. “Huge Hairy Face” “1 turned around expecting to shoo off the neighbours’ cat when a huge hairy face was thrust into mine,” she said.

Mrs Adams said she stood completely still. The baboons casually vaulted the fence and went through the open kitchen door into the pantry.

Mrs Adams rushed into the street and met zoo employees searching for the animals. A number of the zoo staff arrived armed with cages, nets, chloroform and a tranquiliser gun. Mr C. J. Cutler, director of the zoo, said today that a dangerous situation could have developed as all baboons could be extremely vicious. Climbed Shelves The baooons first wrecked Mrs Adams’s pantry, strewing food over the floor, and when!

they noticed the arrival of zoo staff climbed up shelves. Mr Kuiper said chloroform on pads was thrown into the room with no effect. A chloroform soaked towel was then put in, but the baboons were not affected by it. Holes were drilled in a piece of wood sawn out large enough for the tranquiliser gun to be aimed through. The baboons received a dose large enough to kill 10 people, said Mr Kuiper, but 10 minutes after their return to the zoo were sitting up eating, none the worse for their escapade. Trapped In Garage The third baboon was trapped in Mr Cutler’s garage but later escaped. It was chased up a tree, showed signs of becoming vicious, and was shot. Mr Kuiper said all safety measures possible were taken in the zoo.

Authoress Dies.—The novelist, Flannery O’Connor, rated among America’s foremost contemporary writers, who has I suffered from a bone ailment for some years, died yesterday, aged 39.—Milledgeville I (Georgia), Aug. 4.