Bre Avery Zacharski
At around 1 p.m. yesterday afternoon in Yemassee, South Carolina, the Yemassee Police Department was informed that 43 monkeys escaped from a local research facility called Alpha Genesis.
Located at 95 Castle Hall Road, Alpha Genesis indicated on their website that they provide “the highest quality nonhuman primate products and bio-research services worldwide.”
“With a client base that extends across North America, Europe, and Asia, we are dedicated to providing only the best and most cost-effective primate research and development support to the scientific community,” they go on to say.
The monkeys are used to conduct research trials, and federal data reports that Alpha Genesis is home to over 6,000 different monkeys.
As for the ones that got loose, it’s not clear how that happened in the first place, but they were not being used for trials at the time they escaped.
The Yemassee Police Department wrote in a press release shared on social media that the escapees are quite young, female, and only weigh around six or seven pounds.
“…The animals have never been used for testing due to their young age and size,” the department clarified.
“A spokesperson from Alpha Genesis can confirm that these animals are too young to carry disease.”
The Yemassee Police Department quickly set to work along with Alpha Genesis to search for all of the missing monkeys, which are Rhesus monkeys.
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