German police urged residents of Berlin’s southern suburbs to stay indoors on Thursday as they searched the area for a stray wild animal, apparently a lioness. The population was also advised to keep their pets indoors.
Alarms were raised after two people saw what appeared to be a lioness hunting a wild boar on a street less than three miles from the German capital.
“Around midnight we received a message that is hard to imagine. Two passers-by who saw an animal chasing another,” Daniel Keip, spokesman for the Brandenburg police, told RBB radio.
“One was a wild boar and the other was apparently a wild animal, a lioness. Both men recorded the video with their phones and even veteran police officers had to admit it was probably a lioness,” he added.
#löwe in #smallmachinenow @polizeiberlin You won’t find anything like that pic.twitter.com/hZmIcNZK7j
– deer BSC (@lqzze1) July 20, 2023
Bittemeisjes Sie es aufgrund eines entlaufen Wildtieres aktuell im Bereich Kleinmachnow, Teltow & Stahnsdorf (PM) das Haus zu verlassen en holen Sie auch Ihre Haustiere ins Haus. There are no Collegen for Ort and prüfen de Situatie. pic.twitter.com/AqODrxySH
-Polizei Brandenburg (@PolizeiBB) July 20, 2023
The Berlin police later alerted the population to the presence of the wild animal on the streets, first alerting the southwestern suburbs and then expanding the search area.
While authorities, supported by several helicopters, searched the area around the communities of Kleinmachnow, Teltow and Stahnsdorf, residents were asked to stay indoors at the start of another work day.
“The escaped wild animal has not yet been found!”, the police in the Brandenburg region around Berlin wrote on Twitter. “We ask that you do not leave the house.” Pets must also stay indoors, officials added.
No, that’s not Aprilscherz: Bei #Small Machnu im Suden von #Berlin this is it #Raubkatze be gesichtet – vermutlich eine #Few. Die #polished so with Hubschraubern nach dem Tier. Anwohnende sollen zuhause bleiben. pic.twitter.com/PFF0vzOCOQ
-rbb|24 (@rbb24) July 20, 2023
It is unclear where the lioness might have fled to. “No animal park, zoo or circus misses an animal of this type,” the police spokesperson told RBB.
In the searches, the police use drones, which make aerial images of the area where the operation to capture the wild animal takes place.
A veterinarian and two hunters also joined the search.
A spokeswoman for Kleinmachnow council told RBB that nurseries were instructed to keep children inside buildings and vendors at a local market were asked not to set up their stalls.
Once the animal is found, it will likely be sedated with a sedative and taken to an animal shelter, the Brandenburg police spokesman said.
If someone encounters a wild animal, the most important thing is not to panic, says Florian Eiserlo of the animal welfare organization “Vier Pfoten”.
“Keep still, calm, try to go to a safe place, such as a car or a building,” Eiserlo told the Rheinische Post newspaper.
It is not the first time that Germans have been ordered to look out for stray wild animals.
In May, residents of the central German city of Erfurt were shocked to see a kangaroo on a busy street after escaping from private property.
In 2019, it took several days for a deadly snake to be recaptured in the western town of Herne, where residents were told to keep their windows closed.
In 2016, zookeepers at Germany’s zoo had to kill a lion after it escaped from its home in the eastern city of Leipzig. No sedative could stop him.
News updated at 10:33
Source: DN
