A stray hippo roaming the streets of Mbombela is now in the care and safety of the Mpumalanga Wildlife Protection Services (MWPS) after a successful rescue operation took place in the early hours of Sunday morning.
According to reports issued by Lowvelder, a local media site, the hippo was spotted on the streets of Mbombela. It was spotted grazing on a patch of grass near the main road and no one is sure of how it had found its way into the urban area.
Emer_G_Med, a private medical and ambulance service company captured images of the hippo strolling the streets.
《Nelspruit》@EMER_G_MED @lowvelder @nelspruitpost
Only in Nelspruit! Young male found on the R40 Bosch street off ramp doing his evening grazing. Parks Board darted the young man and was last night safely relocated back into the Kruger National Park pic.twitter.com/KcGiFEz2Ta— EMER-G-MED (@EMER_G_MED) January 13, 2019
The hippo was darted three times by Mpumalanga Wildlife Protection Services after midnight before being transported to safety.
Bossies Community Justice operations manager Albert Greyvenstein told News24 the relocation of the hippo was challenging. “It took three darts to get him to fall asleep and he had to be lifted onto the truck by crane,” he said.
The rescue operation took three hours to complete. To ensure the safety of the public and the hippo, access to the road was blocked until the animal was safely removed.
Greyvenstein explained, “The R40 is one of the main routes in Mbombela, and it is a busy road, so we had to ensure the hippo didn’t wander into the traffic.”
A Hi-Tech officer, Clint Wesley, told the Louwvelder it was not a common sighting and it was the third that he had seen in over 25 years.
Picture: Twitter/ EMER_G_MED
