A wild boar wandered into a Berlin shopping centre's home decor shop, sparking a police response that drew in officers and veterinarians equipped with an anaesthetic gun, wooden shields and even a blowgun but ended peacefully.
Police said they were alerted to the hog around 9am when it slipped through sliding glass doors into the shopping centre and started rummaging through the aisles, as staff quickly vacated the shop.
Berlin's Tierpark zoo told AFP it deployed a team to the scene in the southeastern Koepenick district but quickly assessed "that sedating the animal was not possible due to the layout of the premises".
Police said officers and the zoo team eventually decided it was best to drive the boar out by "constructing a path using wooden pallets".
It added that "the wild boar then returned to the forest, which we assume it came from".
It was not the first time a wild boar has roamed built-up areas of the German capital, which is surrounded by woods.
In mid-2023, a wild boar prowling the streets of southwestern Berlin sparked panic after it was briefly mistaken for a lioness.
