Several chimpanzees used a makeshift ladder of branches to escape their zoo enclosure in the Northern Ireland city of Belfast on Sunday. The branches had fallen in bad weather over the weekend and had not yet been removed by zookeepers. A little girl whose father captured the clever chimps on video can be heard scolding the primates, telling them, “Don’t escape, you bad little gorilla.” The chimps were later seen on a pedestrian path on the zoo grounds before being captured. The young girl’s mother Danielle Monaghan, told the BBC, “I was petrified, obviously, having the kids, and I tried not to show fear but inside I was a bit like, ‘What happens if it attacks us or tries to take the kids or runs over?’” The daring dash for freedom came on the heels of another escape from the same zoo earlier this month. Amber, a red panda cub, was found in a residential garden about a mile from the zoo after she escaped. She was missing for more than 24 hours.
