Four monkeys took advantage of a traffic accident to escape from the truck transporting them to the Florida laboratory to which they were destined, according to Pennsylvania police who recovered three and were still looking for the fourth on Saturday.
The truck carrying around 100 crab-eating macaques collided with a garbage truck on Friday afternoon near the small town of Danville, in the center of this northeastern United States state.
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Four monkeys "
escaped from the scene of the accident and disappeared in the vicinity
", tweeted the local police, who called on the population not to approach the animals.
Three of them were later captured, but the fourth was still at large Saturday morning.
“
Update on the accident: there is still a monkey missing, we ask that no one tries to sight or capture the animal
,” police added on Saturday.
Used in Covid vaccine research
According to local channel WNEP, a police helicopter equipped with thermal cameras helped locate the macaques during searches carried out in the middle of the night in freezing cold.
Pennsylvania police released a photo showing a monkey perched in a tree, dazzled by a flashlight.
According to WNEP, police surrounded the animal and then shots were heard.
The fate of the recovered animals was not known on Saturday.
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The price of a crab-eating macaque, also called a long-tailed macaque, can reach $10,000.
These very common monkeys in Southeast Asia have been widely used in research on Covid vaccines, according to the New York Times.
They can live 30 years in captivity.