Two animals remain on the loose in South Carolina as the state continues its search fugitive monkeys that escaped from a medical research center in Beaufort County. But this time it’s two emus named Thelma and Louise who escaped about a three-hour drive north.
Horry County police wrote about the large missing birds on Wednesday, saying, “We have not emigrated.”
“The department is aware of the reported emus and we have contacted the owner. We are working to assist the owner in locating and capturing the animals,” the Facebook post said. “There is no risk to the community associated with the emus at this time.”
As of early Friday morning, CBS News said they had no update on the missing birds and that any additional information would be posted online.
Sam Morace, the owner of the birds, told CBS News on Friday that the emus are named Thelma and Louise and have yet to be captured. “They decided they wanted to jump the fence when we tried to grab one of them to move her to another paddock and they didn’t like it,” she said in a message. “So she’s living a wild life, and they both are.”
Morace posted to a community group on Tuesday that the birds became loose three months ago.
“They are wild and not trained like the ones we have in our home,” Morace wrote. “The local police have already been to my house, we are trying to get an anesthetic approved so we can take them home. Thank you for all your concerns and questions. But if the emus were that easy to catch, they would already be home. ”
The large, flightless creatures are the second largest living bird, with an average height of more than 1.5 meters. Females, like the ones that escaped in South Carolina, can weigh more than 130 pounds. The animals are not native to the United States and naturally reside only in Australia.
Morace’s Facebook post attracted a lot of attention from community members, with one person suggesting that herding dogs could help. But Morace said one of the emus had previously been attacked by three wild dogs and the bird managed to kill them before they could kill it.
“If your dogs try to attack her, she will fight back. But she won’t just go up to anyone or any animal,” Morace said, saying elsewhere in the post that the bird is “more afraid of you than you are of her. .”
Some community members said they had seen the bird.
“I was quite shocked and so was the woman,” one person commented. “For example, is that an emu next to the fire station? I turned around to take a picture and it was already gone!”
News of the fugitive emus comes days after the escape of another group of animals – 43 monkeys. They left the property after a caretaker failed to secure the gate to their gated compound. Thirty-two rhesus monkey primates had been recaptured after escaping from the Alpha Genesis research facility in Yemassee.
