A missing clouded leopard shut down the Dallas Zoo on Friday as police helped search for the animal that officials described as not dangerous and likely hiding somewhere on the zoo grounds.
The small cat weighs about 20-25 pounds (9-11 kilograms), said Harrison Edell, executive vice president of animal care and conservation at the Dallas Zoo. The search inside Texas' largest zoo was focused on scouring trees, which Edell said clouded leopards like to climb.
The zoo tweeted that the missing cat, named Nova, was a “serious situation,” but Edell said the animal posed no threat to humans.
“If anything, she's real nervous and afraid of people,” Edell said.
He did not say how the animal escaped its enclosure. Another clouded leopard at the zoo, Nova's sister, was still in its habitat, Edell said.
Animals have escaped enclosures from the Dallas Zoo before. Most notably was in 2004, when a 340-pound (154-kilogram) gorilla named Jabari jumped over a wall and went on a 40-minute rampage that injured three people before police shot and killed the animal.
Las Vegas police arrested and charged a 16-year-old boy for allegedly posting terror threats online and linking his actions to ISIS.
One security guard was killed and another injured following a stabbing at a Macy's store in Philadelphia Monday.
A Boston woman died Monday after being attacked by a shark while paddle boarding in the Bahamas.
Authorities are investigating an explosion at a home in Arlington, Virginia where police were attempting to serve a search warrant.
A volcanic eruption that began in Indonesia Sunday has left 11 climbers dead and at least a dozen people missing.
Former Minneapolis police officer, Derek Chauvin is back in prison after being stabbed multiple times at the Federal Correctional Institution in Tucson, Arizona.
A former U.S. diplomat has been arrested and accused of being a secret Cuban spy.
The U.S. Air Force has confirmed divers found the remains of five U.S. service members in the wreckage of an Osprey aircraft that crashed off the coast of Japan last week.
Authorities say 33-year-old Jerrid Joseph Powell is due to appear in court Monday.
The Israeli military has renewed its calls for mass evacuations from the southern town of Khan Younis, where tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians have sought refuge in recent weeks.
