News

Monkey Broke Into Primary School & Students Had to Go on ‘Lockdown’

2022-02-21 , 11:18 am

You might remember having to go through fire drills while in school, to simulate how to proceed in the event of a fire. In recent years, lockdown drills were also carried out due to the rise of terrorist attacks.

However, in one primary school, the lockdown drill proved useful. All because of a…monkey.

Close All Doors & Windows

Yep, you didn’t read it wrongly, the highly intelligent primates recently engaged in some monkey business that terrorised students of Chongfu School in Yishun.

On Thursday morning, teachers and students of the school hurriedly closed the doors and windows to their classrooms after a monkey was spotted clambering up the four-storey school building and onto the roof.

A concerned parent had contacted Shin Min Daily News who told the paper of the monkey intrusion.

The parent, a 46-year-old engineer, said the school had warned pupils a day earlier about monkey sightings and that it had dispatched personnel to keep a lookout at locations where the primates tend to appear. According to his son, the school had told pupils to avoid those areas.

The man added that among parents, there was speculation if the sightings involved just one monkey or a group of them, and that he had not heard from the school regarding the incident.

Spotted By Primary School Students

Another parent said that his nine-year-old son had witnessed the monkey intrusion on Thursday.

When interviewed, the boy said he saw a monkey climbing up onto the roof of the school and that his friend who also saw the monkey screamed in shock.

The principal informed teachers through the internal broadcast system to close all doors and windows to the classrooms. However, pupils were still allowed to exit the classrooms to go for their recess.

A domestic helper whom Shin Min Daily News spoke to outside the school said she had heard that in another recent incident, there had been three monkeys that were locked in one of the toilets.

The monkeys escaped when the door was later opened by a security guard, said the 28-year-old helper.

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Concerned Parents

Parents expressed worry over the monkey sightings and have advised their children not to go close to the monkeys if they come across the animals.

One parent, a 39-year-old housewife, said she is concerned that children might scream when they see a monkey; this might then trigger the monkey to turn aggressive. Another said the monkeys are usually attracted to food and was worried they would attack.

Increasing Public Monkey Business

This is not the first time the primates have been spotted in public.

NTU students are well-associated with the monkeys after multiple break-ins to hostel rooms. Another incident that occurred recently saw a boy hilariously negotiating with a monkey who had ransacked his school bag.

With the local vast greenery, it can understandably be hard for monkeys to identify their boundaries. Well hopefully, we don’t see a Planet of the Apes come to reality here.

In case you ever bump into one, here is what Animal Concerns Research and Education Society (Acres) says you should do: those who come across wild monkeys should not shout, stare at or bare their teeth at them. They should also not feed the monkeys and always keep a safe distance.