Police on patrol near Paris look for tiger on the prowl

PARIS – Scores of police patrolled a small town west of the French capital Thursday night after a tiger eluded a massive search and remained on the prowl in the region near Disneyland Paris.

The small beast was spotted Thursday morning near a parking lot in Montevrain by a woman who snapped a photo of it.

Still on the loose by nightfall, some began to doubt whether it really was a tiger.

The Parc des Felins, a wild cat animal park 18 miles from Montevrain, said none of its cats were missing.

EuroDisney, the operator of Disneyland Paris, a top tourist destination in Europe, went out of its way to say the theme park has no tigers.

But authorities remained on alert.

Montevrain said 100 police would patrol the town of less than 10,000 overnight and the search for the animal would begin anew today.

Nearly 200 police, gendarmes, rescuers with tranquilizing guns and a specially trained dog searched the area Thursday. Authorities urged people in Montevrain, nearby Chessy and Chalifert to stay indoors, and children were escorted home from school.

The animal was spotted about 8:30 a.m. by the wife of supermarket manager Jean-Baptiste Berdeaux, who told BFM-TV she initially thought it was a lynx. She snapped the photo of it standing on a ridge above a parking lot.

An examination of a muddy footprint indicated it was a tiger weighing about 154 pounds and about 1 1/2 years old, said Clement Joly, a Montevrain spokesman.