Chimp flees Japan zoo, caught after falling from power pole

Chacha, the male chimp, screams at a worker in Sendai, northern Japan on April 14 after fleeing from a zoo. The chimpanzee tried desperately to avoid being captured by climbing an electric pole. Chacha was on the loose nearly two hours Thursday after it disappeared from the Yagiyama Zoological Park in Sendai, the city that’s hosting finance ministers from the Group of Seven industrialized nations in May. AP

TOKYO—A chimpanzee fled from a zoo in northern Japan and tried desperately to avoid being captured by climbing an electric pole.

Not for long.

Chacha, the male chimp, was on the loose nearly two hours Thursday after it disappeared from the Yagiyama Zoological Park in Sendai, the city that’s hosting finance ministers from the Group of Seven industrialized nations in May.

TV footage showed Chacha perched atop the pole, agitated and screaming at zoo workers below. Even after being hit by a sedative arrow in the back, Chacha desperately tried to escape, dangling from a power line.

He finally gave up and fell head down into a blanket held by a dozen workers on the ground. It’s not immediately clear if he survived.

Zoo officials are investigating how he escaped.