A young moose tried to cross an icy river in Canada and got stuck in the middle. A couple driving by spotted the animal and began a challenging rescue operation to help it, videos show.
Jolyne Lavoie was out for a drive with her husband, Claude, in New Brunswick when she saw the “young moose stuck on the ice,” she wrote in a Jan. 7 Facebook post.
“At first, we were not sure if her legs were broken; she was just sprawled out on the ice,” Lavoie told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. “When she saw us, she probably got scared a bit, and she tried to move so we knew that her legs were fine. She was just slipping and couldn’t get off the ice because of the water.”
Lavoie told CTV News, a Canadian outlet, that they found a ratchet strap in their vehicle and, with the aid of some nearby peace officers, decided to help the stranded animal.
Peace officers are different from police officers and focus on conservation, highway safety and general investigations, according to the Government of New Brunswick.
Video footage shows the difficult rescue process. One of the rescuers walked onto the ice to tie the strap around the moose’s leg. The pair managed to pull the moose to the bank. At first, the moose just sat there and did not try to stand.
The rescuers untied the moose’s leg and put the strap around the animal’s neck, the video shows. Eventually, the moose tried to stand but still could not get traction on the slippery, partially wet ice.
At one point, the video shows the strap come off the moose’s neck, and the animal slid back onto the ice. Still, the rescuers try again.
The pair finally managed to haul the moose off the ice and far enough up the snowy bank that it could stand, a second video shows. The exhausted moose took a few wobbly steps before standing still. Throughout the rescue, the relatively large animal appeared calm.
“My husband, you know, petted her and tried to get her warm a little bit so that was pretty special,” Lavoie told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.
“It was just like a whole situation where everything was falling into place,” Lavoie told CTV News. “It was the best case scenario.”
Moose are generally protective animals and will defend their territory and their young. When people encounter a moose, wildlife officials typically advise them to give the animal space and to not try getting it to move out of the way.
Lavoie’s moose encounter took place near Rogersville, New Brunswick, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported. Rogersville is about 500 miles northeast of Ottawa.
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