Wildlife officials have had quite a morning on Friday as a pair of moose wandered into Calgary city limits.
The first animal was spotted in the parking lot of Marlborough Mall, driven there by the noise of the morning rush hour.
Police and wildlife officers soon arrived and attempted to keep an eye on the bull moose, worried that it might run into traffic or charge someone.
Eventually the moose found itself cornered in a resident’s backyard and that’s when authorities needed to take action.
“Fish and Wildlife attempted to tranquilize the animal, but the tranquilizer didn’t take,” said Sgt. Paul Magnus with the Calgary Police Service. “It got penned into a backyard and when it turned on the officers, it had to be euthanized.”
Diane Day, who lives in the home where the moose was shot behind says she heard a loud bang. "I went to the kitchen window and there's this huge moose in the backyard. There were a bunch of police and wildlife officers. Thank goodness they stayed back because this thing was wild. It cornered itself."
Day said the animal was very agitated, even after it got the tranquilizer. "Had they not, there would have been a lot of hurt people."
Officials say that it’s unfortunate that they had to kill the animal, but they had to take public safety into consideration.
There are several elementary schools in the area where the moose was roaming and there were lots of children as the incident was unfolding.
A panicked moose, which would be very aggressive and could trample anyone in sight, could have put a lot of those students in danger.
As for the second moose, the animal was spotted lying down in a field in the Foothills Industrial Area on Friday morning.
Officials are monitoring the animal.
