Phantom Penguin Chaser Still at Large!

North Yorkshire Police are currently appealing for witnesses to an incident at the Sea Life Centre in Scarborough that occurred in the

This Stressed Penguin was snapped by our man on the ground. No penguins were harmed in the taking of this photograph. Copyright Graham Holden 2011 photos@gholden.co.uk)(

early hours of the morning on the 25th of April 2011.

CCTV images captured an intruder breaking into the penguin enclosure.  The centre manager, Mike Salt told the BBC that the trespasser chased the penguins around the enclosure for fifteen minutes.

“Penguins are very susceptible to stress, they like their routine and any change can prove threatening to them. This incident would have been really frightening.  They have been clearly upset and were off their food for several days.”*

Police are currently examining the CCTV images in an attempt to identify the culprit.  We attempted to ascertain if they had learnt anything from their website, but our search for “penguin” had no results.  We did find that it was very easy to access the sex offenders register, but that was not really relevant here.

Graham, our man on the iceberg had this offering on the subject:

“The intruders must have been dressed a leopard seals.  Penguins seem to have no special fear of humans, and have approached groups of explorers without hesitation. This is probably because penguins have no land predators in Antarctica or the nearby offshore islands. Instead, penguins are at risk at sea from predators such as the leopard seal.  But then, a leopard seal would be easy to spot on CCTV.”

Looks like Graham’s been reading the encyclopaedia this week, and has reached P for penguin…

Since she is from Yorkshire and regularly stressed over something (although strictly speaking not a penguin), we felt that Catherine Sykes was qualified enough to offer us a comment on the subject.

“How awful…” She managed to splutter between sobs.  “Poor penguins.  What on earth was the point of that, what possessed the idiot?  Was he stupid or drunk?  Probably both.  I can only console myself with the knowledge that he didn’t catch any of them.  They were too fast for him!  Hoorah!”

She then added “I’ve currently got an album out.  It’s very good even if I do say so myself.  You can get your copy from my website.”

Whilst we are not entirely sure of the relevance of this last statement, we are grateful that anyone is prepared to take us seriously enough to offer us any sort of comment.

Although our investigative report did not turn up any new information, we were able to eliminate one man from the suspect pool.  Matthew Scott from Huddersfield offered us this by way of a comment:

“It weren’t me gov, honest.  My alibi is water tight.”

We are glad that in our own small way we can assist the police in their enquiries.  If you have any slightly more useful information on the culprit then you can contact North Yorkshire Police.  We will of course keep you updated with any additional information.

*The BBC’s original report is available here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-13267797

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