Photo: Jimmy May/Bloomsburg Press Enterprise via AP
A group of around 100 monkeys have been successfully located following a collision between two vehicles on a Pennsylvania roadway.
On Friday, a Dodge truck carrying the primates in an enclosed trailer crashed into a dump truck while both were driving on a road in Montour County, according topress releasefrom the Montour County Sheriff’s Office. The crash caused crates full of monkeys in cages to spill onto the road.
In asocial media statement, authorities said that “a small number of monkeys” had escaped from the scene of the incident and gone “into the surrounding area.” Police warned residents to keep their distance and to call 911 if they spotted one of the loose animals.
In an update on Saturday morning, policetweetedthat there was still one monkey unaccounted for, before afollow-up statementthat same night alerted residents that each primate had been found.
Jimmy May/Bloomsburg Press Enterprise via AP
The Montour County Sheriff’s Office did not specify exactly how many monkeys had initially escaped the scene, or if any of the animals were injured.
Speaking withThe Daily Item, Police Trooper Andrea Pelachick explained that the monkeys — which were cynomolgus macaques — had been on their way to a lab.
The location of the lab, as well as the type of research that the animals would be used for, wasn’t specified, though the outlet noted crab-eating macaques are “often used in medical studies.”
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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Department of Health, and the Pennsylvania Game Commission all aided in the search,The Daily Itemreported.
“All 100 of the cynomolgus macaques are accounted for; three are deceased,” Kristen Nordlund, a spokesperson for the CDC, said in an email to the publication. “Three of the monkeys were humanely euthanized according to American Veterinary Medical Association guidelines.”
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The driver of the dump truck, meanwhile, was also uninjured and did not receive any medical attention.
source: people.com
