A resident of the South Carolina town where dozens of monkeys are on the loose has revealed his terrifying encounter with one of the “sick” animals from a separate incident.
This Wednesday at lunchtime, 43 rhesus macaques escaped from a research facility known as the “monkey farm” in Yemassee, a town of just 1,000 people about 50 miles west of Charleston.
This sparked a major search operation in which police set up traps and cameras around the town and urged locals to lock their doors and windows to keep the primates away, although officers insist that “there is no threat” to public health.
Residents say they have had to deal with multiple monkey escapes linked to the Alpha Genesis laboratory in recent years, but this is the first time they have been told to lock down their homes.
A local business owner, who asked to remain anonymous, told DailyMail.com how he came face to face with a monkey with a tumor the size of a softball on its neck and a deranged look in its eyes. a separate incident, they said. It happened in 2020.
The local heard a noise on the roof of his store and came out to find the animal on top of his air conditioner, describing it as “strange.”
“This monkey looked sick, he looked very unhappy. There was something in the monkey’s eyes,’ they said. “So we called the police and they told the lab, and then people dressed in hazmat came to take it away.”
Meanwhile, Dr Greg Westergaard, CEO of Alpha Genesis, told DailyMail.com that the latest accident occurred after a keeper failed to properly close the door to an outdoor enclosure housing a group of young monkeys.
The images above show one of the escaped monkeys in the woods near the laboratory.
Local business owner Charlotte Murray said she was not worried, although this was the first time she had heard of so many monkeys escaping the premises.
“It’s not like they left the door open,” he said, “the guy closed it but the latch wasn’t secured properly, so it was ‘monkey proof.'”
“And then they all disappeared in a flood, if you look at a flock of birds in the sky, it was a bit like that.”
The Alpha Genesis facility raises monkeys for use in research into vaccines and medications for a variety of diseases.
Dr Westergaard said the current troop of escaped monkeys did not pose a threat of infecting people because they had not yet been used in experiments.
The escaped monkeys are mostly small females weighing 6 to 7 pounds, Dr. Westergaard said, who are “scary” and sensitive to loud noises and sudden movements.
He said police had tracked them to the woods near the facility, where baited traps are being set to try to recapture them.
But local business owner Charlotte Murray said she knows residents who claim to have witnessed the primates in their yards.
Ms Murray, who has lived in the area for decades, told DailyMail.com: “The center normally does a great job during escapes, but this is the first time I remember people having been asked to keep doors and closed windows. That’s a change.
‘I’ve seen escaped monkeys near the town hall campus before, but it’s been quite some time since this happened.
«In general, we are not very afraid here. They are lovely animals and I understand that these (the latest escapees) are very small, so I am not afraid.’
Despite police advice to close the homes, DailyMail.com spoke to several other residents who seemed equally unconcerned.
Someone joked that they planned to put out bananas as gifts for the animals.
Dr. Greg Westergaard, CEO of Alpha Genesis, said the escaped monkeys were currently sitting in trees near the center. The video is from the Island Package.
The facility, which houses more than a thousand monkeys, is located outside the town of Yemassee, 50 miles west of Charleston.
TO 2022 report The USDA found that between January and August of that year, six leaks were recorded.
In one case, a troop of 10 monkeys escaped through a weak chain link in their fence, while in three other incidents the monkeys managed to remove the wooden panels separating their cages.
There was also an incident where a monkey escaped and abandoned medical care after
Alpha Genesis was fined $12,000 in June 2018 for four previous leaks, as well as other problems with its enclosures.
The image above shows a monkey in an enclosure in the center. The escaped monkeys had been there for a month. The video is from Island package
Forty monkeys have escaped from a research center in South Carolina. Pictured above is a wild macaque in Thailand.
In 2016, 19 monkeys escaped from their cage and were captured almost six hours later.
And in December 2014, when about 26 monkeys also escaped from the facilities.
Alpha Genesis also runs another monkey housing facility on Morgan Island, off the coast of South Carolina.
In total, it houses more than 5,000 monkeys at the two sites.