US authorities have captured and killed several lab monkeys that escaped in a traffic accident.
The truck with 100 long-tailed macaques was involved in an accident with a garbage truck in the US state of Pennsylvania on Friday afternoon (local time), the police said.
A “small number of monkeys” then fled.
The three escaped animals were tracked down by Saturday evening.
The news website "WNEP" reported, citing the US health authority CDCP, that the captured macaques had been euthanized. The police had warned the population against "looking for or catching" the animals themselves. According to "WNEP", the officials searched for the animals with a helicopter with thermal cameras. They later published the photo of one of the primates perched in a tree in the freezing cold night.
According to WNEP, the macaques from Mauritius were brought to New York by plane on Friday.
They were to be transported by truck to a laboratory in Florida.
Long-tailed macaques, also known as cynomolgus monkeys, can cost up to $10,000, according to a New York Times report, and are in high demand for vaccine research.
In captivity, the animals can live up to 30 years.