Escaped circus elephant thunders down Montana city street after car backfires, scares her hours before show
What a circus.
A Montana city got the show of a lifetime Tuesday when a show elephant broke free from her pen and tore down a busy street.
Thrilling video shows the gentle giant thundering down Butte’s Harrison Avenue around noon, seemingly unbothered by the line of cars cautiously traveling in each direction.
The elephant hilariously crosses the street in a designated turning lane — albeit in the opposite direction — as a man carrying a stick desperately tries to corral the animal.
Another angle, captured by a local gas station, showed the elephant beeline through a casino parking lot and straight down a residential block — calmly striding as if she were on a regular afternoon walk.
It turns out the elephant, affectionately known as Viola, was in town with the Jordan World Circus.
Her handlers had been giving her a bath outside the Civic Center when a car backfired and spooked her, the venue’s manager Bill Melvin told the Daily Montanan.
She took off, but only made it a few hundred yards before she stopped to munch on some grass in a neighbor’s yard. The chase lasted about 10 minutes.
Fortunately, no one was injured and the 58-year-old elephant was returned to her circus family.
“The circus, of course, is very professional, and they had a professional trainer and he was real calm and the animal was calm and they were able to get her right back,” Melvin said.
“It was not nearly as dramatic as you would think.”
The short-lived escape also failed to derail the performances — the Jordan World Circus put on its 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. shows without a hitch.
Not everyone found the incident charming, however.
Animal advocacy groups PETA and PAWS released respective statements alleging that the escape did not mark Viola’s first attempt at freedom.
“Viola’s desperate break for freedom follows decades of abuse and involuntary servitude at the hands of Carson & Barnes Circus, which forces her to perform grueling, painful tricks and has been caught on video electroshocking elephants and beating them with a sharp, steel-tipped bullhook,” PETA said in a statement.
PETA also alleged that Carson & Barnes Circus, which supplied the elephants to Jordan World Circus, has a history of forcing elephants to perform grueling exercises and has been cited for more than 100 violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act.
Neither circus group immediately responded to The Post’s request for comment.