Australians often joke that tourists expect to see kangaroos hopping across the Sydney Harbour Bridge but the joke was on police on Tuesday when a wayward wallaby led them in an early-morning chase across the famous landmark.
Police said they chased the mysterious marsupial on foot and in a car over the bridge before dawn before catching it in a downtown park and taking it to the city’s Taronga Zoo.
“Officers took the startled macropod into police custody … with the police mounted unit arriving on scene soon after to take it to the zoo for veterinary assessment,” New South Wales Police said in a statement.
Video filmed from a pursuing patrol car showed the meter-high wallaby, which looks like a small kangaroo, hopping across the famous bridge.
A policeman stifled a laugh as he drove behind.
“Sydney’s got the best harbor in the world, so I’d imagine he was taking in the view,” police inspector Kylie Smith later told reporters. “We actually do have wallabies or kangaroos that jump down the main street of Sydney.”
Nicknamed “The Coathanger,” Sydney’s famous arch-span bridge opened in 1932 and, with 8 traffic lanes, 2 railway lines and a footpath and cycleway, is the main harbor crossing linking the city with its northern suburbs.
While wallabies and kangaroos are found in both rural and leafy suburban areas, it is highly unusual to see them in the middle of a major city.
