The recent Berlin lioness chase has finally come to a rather anticlimactic end. What was believed to have been a stray lioness roaming in a forest turned out to be a false alarm, as the real culprit was simply a wild boar. These boars have been around the city for a long time, so residents do not worry about this animal. However, the prospect of a wild lioness freely wandering in the woods is a very serious matter in Berlin.
The chase was prompted by a reported sighting from two men of what appeared to be a lioness, as displayed from footage of a grainy cellphone camera. But after two days, all experts concluded that it was simply a stray boar, marking the end of a dramatic chase.
When the two men reported the sighting of the lioness-turned-boar, they immediately sent it to the police and the situation rapidly escalated. The police first attempted to determine where the lioness came from by calling the Circus Rogall in Teltow, but they did not have the answers the police were looking for. Alerts started to appear online with news reports and articles about the suspected lioness, and they urged Berlin residents to remain in their house as well as cancel any outdoor events.
Police officers started to scout the forests to attempt to spot any big cats. Workers from a local zoo drove to the stakeout and prepared themselves with tranquilizer guns in case they spotted the lioness they were looking for. When night arrived that day, residents reported hearing loud roars that sounded like a lion coming from a nearby forest. However, a German television network later concluded that what really happened was that teenagers were playing animal noises through a speaker. After that incident, the police took it even further to track down the reported lioness.
Uda Bastians, a resident of Kleinmachnow, said in an interview, “The atmosphere was quite tense. There weren’t many people in the street, and the people you met, everyone was a bit afraid.” According to Ms. Bastians, there were helicopters flying overhead scouting for any signs of a big cat, and all this overwhelmed her to the point where she chose to exercise her dog in her garden instead of taking it out for a normal walk. However, the search was finally called off after a resident called the police on Friday morning reporting that they had spotted the lioness.
When the police heard about the news, they prepared a drone to fly over the area, as well as sending in 30 officers with heat-imaging cameras. However, what they were not prepared to discover was a family of wild boars. Boar sightings occur quite often in Berlin, but the false alarm still came as a “huge surprise,” according to Ms. Bastians. The believed lioness was later confirmed to be a boar by several experts, including Dr. Hofer, a worker in the Serengeti since 1978. When a local official contacted him on Friday morning, he took a quick dive and said that while some characteristics matched those of a wildcat, most factors made it look more like a wild boar.
The chase was prompted by a reported sighting from two men of what appeared to be a lioness, as displayed from footage of a grainy cellphone camera. But after two days, all experts concluded that it was simply a stray boar, marking the end of a dramatic chase.
When the two men reported the sighting of the lioness-turned-boar, they immediately sent it to the police and the situation rapidly escalated. The police first attempted to determine where the lioness came from by calling the Circus Rogall in Teltow, but they did not have the answers the police were looking for. Alerts started to appear online with news reports and articles about the suspected lioness, and they urged Berlin residents to remain in their house as well as cancel any outdoor events.
Police officers started to scout the forests to attempt to spot any big cats. Workers from a local zoo drove to the stakeout and prepared themselves with tranquilizer guns in case they spotted the lioness they were looking for. When night arrived that day, residents reported hearing loud roars that sounded like a lion coming from a nearby forest. However, a German television network later concluded that what really happened was that teenagers were playing animal noises through a speaker. After that incident, the police took it even further to track down the reported lioness.
Uda Bastians, a resident of Kleinmachnow, said in an interview, “The atmosphere was quite tense. There weren’t many people in the street, and the people you met, everyone was a bit afraid.” According to Ms. Bastians, there were helicopters flying overhead scouting for any signs of a big cat, and all this overwhelmed her to the point where she chose to exercise her dog in her garden instead of taking it out for a normal walk. However, the search was finally called off after a resident called the police on Friday morning reporting that they had spotted the lioness.
When the police heard about the news, they prepared a drone to fly over the area, as well as sending in 30 officers with heat-imaging cameras. However, what they were not prepared to discover was a family of wild boars. Boar sightings occur quite often in Berlin, but the false alarm still came as a “huge surprise,” according to Ms. Bastians. The believed lioness was later confirmed to be a boar by several experts, including Dr. Hofer, a worker in the Serengeti since 1978. When a local official contacted him on Friday morning, he took a quick dive and said that while some characteristics matched those of a wildcat, most factors made it look more like a wild boar.