Four zebras escaped from a trailer on a highway exit in Washington State on Sunday, leading dozens of residents, police officers and volunteers to join in an effort to corral them.
Among them was a person with particular expertise in the area: a former rodeo clown who mounted a horse to help usher one of the zebras back into the trailer.
“It was kind of divine intervention — we happened to be in the exact spot and had the knowledge,” said Julie Danton, who said she and her husband, David Danton, a former rodeo clown and rodeo bullfighter, were on their way back from a cattle drive in Eastern Washington when they stopped to help.
The zebras were being transported to Montana on Sunday afternoon, when the driver who was hauling them stopped to secure their trailer on an exit off Interstate 90 in North Bend, Wash., about 30 miles east of Seattle, said Trooper Rick Johnson of the Washington State Patrol.
It’s not clear where the zebras were coming from or where, precisely, they were headed, Trooper Johnson said. But somehow, he said, the zebras got loose.
As the animals began scampering through traffic and onto residential streets, dozens of members of the community and the Dantons became involved in the ad-hoc effort to capture them.
“Animal control showed up to help, police showed up, and every neighbor showed up to help — or just look at the zebras — because it’s not every day you get zebras in your neighborhood,” said Megan Dammann, a North Bend resident who runs a kennel-free dog boarding and doggy day-care business.
She said she rushed to the scene after seeing a post about the zebras on a North Bend community Facebook page.
“It was kind of a fabulous group effort, which is what you do here,” Ms. Dammann said, whether the lost animal in question is a dog, a cat or a zebra. “In North Bend, that’s what you do.”
Whitney Blomquist ran to her front porch after seeing the zebras on her security camera. Three were outside her home, she said, wandering near an R.V.
“They looked right at me and walked right toward me,” Ms. Blomquist said. “You’d think you’d have to go to an African safari to be with zebras and here I am standing on my front porch, and they’re 10 feet away from me. It was just insane.”
Ms. Blomquist said neighbors and police officers managed to shoo two of the zebras into a paddock near a barn. Neighbors helped corral a third zebra in a fenced-in yard.
But as of Sunday afternoon, Trooper Johnson said, one zebra was still on the loose. It was not clear on Monday if it had been captured yet, Trooper Johnson said.
Ms. Blomquist said she was keeping her eyes open.
“I keep looking at my cameras every time they go off,” she said. “We’re just aware it’s out there.”