By Carol Robinson
al.com
MACON COUNTY, Ala. — A kangaroo that apparently escaped a petting zoo in one Alabama county ended up on an interstate in another county, causing quite a commotion and a wreck on Tuesday.
Macon County Sheriff Andre Brunson said he received a call from his dispatcher late morning telling him there was a kangaroo on Interstate 85.
“Of course I didn’t believe it,” Brunson said. “It was actually a dern kangaroo.”
ALEA state troopers said they responded to the area of I-85 near mile marker 46 shortly before noon Tuesday on a crash. The crash happened in the southbound lanes and involved a kangaroo, said ALEA Capt. Jeremy Burkett .
Troopers eventually shut down both lanes of I-85 between Auburn and Tuskegee while they worked to capture the kangaroo.
Brunson said law enforcement officers immediately began to try to determine where the kangaroo came from.
His dispatcher located a petting zoo in Lee County , and a call to the owner revealed they did, indeed, have a kangaroo missing.
“We were chasing him for quite a while,” said Brunson, who went live on Facebook during the ordeal. “Traffic was stopped a long ways.”
Brunson said the search took a while. Eventually, the kangaroo was shot twice with a tranquilizer gun by its owner and captured in the tree line off the interstate.
“We’re doing everything we can to get this kangaroo home safety,” Brunson said.
“A kangaroo in Tuskegee, Alabama. Macon County, we see a little bit of everything here,” the sheriff said.
Once captured, the kangaroo was returned to its owner. The kangaroo was not injured.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Brunson said. “We had a bear a few years ago, but never a kangaroo. You never know what you’ll see in Macon County.”
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