Paris Zoo visitors evacuated after 4 baboons escaped

PARIS – The Paris Zoo says visitors have been evacuated after four baboons escaped from their enclosure.

Zoo spokesman Jerome Munier said all four have been located in a closed area. Zoo employees plan to use sedative arrows to capture them and put them back with the rest of the group of 50 baboons.

Paris police intervened Friday to help secure and evacuate the zoo, which will remain temporarily closed until the end of the incident.

Guinea baboons, originated from West Africa, are classified as a “near threatened” species by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

Visitors can usually admire them around the zoo’s “Big Rock” that towers over the Bois de Vincennes park, in eastern Paris.