On the roof of a funeral chapel in the German city of Witten, a monkey sat watching the world below. It was one of six rhesus macaques that had escaped from a local animal facility. The monkeys had been kept at a holding station for their own protection on animal-welfare grounds.
What made this escape remarkable was how they did it. The monkeys scraped the mortar from between the bricks of a wall until they could break through. This was patient, deliberate work, exactly the kind of problem-solving that rhesus macaques are known for. These intelligent primates are native to South, Central and Southeast Asia and are widely used in biomedical research.
Once free, the monkeys scattered across the city. One was filmed on the roof of the main cemetery's funeral chapel. The authorities made a surprising decision: they would not actively search for the animals. Officials said the monkeys pose no danger to the public and asked residents to call the police if they spotted one.
By Thursday afternoon, three of the six monkeys had been recovered, either by returning on their own or being captured using food-baited traps. The other three remained loose somewhere in Witten. For the people of this city in western Germany, an ordinary day now carried a strange possibility: looking out the window and meeting the eyes of a monkey looking back.
These macaques had been waiting to be moved to a zoo or sanctuary when they decided to make their own choice instead.