Passengers gawp as ape takes flight
Passengers aboard a Lufthansa flight from Birmingham to Frankfurt received a shock this week when they boarded the plane to discover that one of their fellow travellers was a baby bonobo ape.
Bili the Bonobo was on his way from Twycross Zoo in Leicestershire to join his foster mother at Frankfurt Zoo after being rejected by his natural mother. Zookeepers feared Bili was too young to travel by himself in the hold and so booked him a seat in the cabin with a handler instead.
The tiny ape even carried his own passport, which pictures in the Daily Mail showed him handing over to a bemused member of Lufthansa’s check-in staff. It was unclear whether she asked him whether he had packed his own bag or was carrying any dangerous items in his luggage.
Bili fell ill soon after he was born and has required extensive nursing and medication. Zoo staff worked around the clock to ensure he was fed milk every two hours after his mother had rejected him.
Zookeepers in Frankfurt hope he will bond with a female adult bonobo who has been trained to assist with hand rearing babies, according to CNN.com. He will also be living with a family of bonobos to help his social skills.
Carsten Knott, the zookeeper who accompanied Bili, said the first-time flyer had enjoyed the experience.
“The crew was informed in advance and they all came to say hello,” said Knott. “The stewardesses took also bananas on board just in case.”
The bonobo, which originates from the Democratic Republic of Congo and is an endangered species, is considered our closest animal relation, sharing more than 96 percent of its DNA with humans.
Originally known as “pygmy chimpanzees”, they have a reputation as peaceful animals who live in a polyamorous communities with both males and females “highly promiscuous and actively bisexual” according to a report last year in the Daily Telegraph.
But their peace-loving reputation has been damaged recently by new research suggesting they have a taste for eating other primates. So if you’re sitting next to a Bonobo next time you catch a flight make sure you give him your complementary nuts.