Southern town locked down after 40 monkeys escape from science lab

Dozens of macaque monkeys are on the loose in a small South Carolinian town after escaping from a medical research facility.

Residents in Yemassee, a town of 1,000 less than 50 miles west of Charleston, have been told to lock their doors and windows to prevent the primates from entering their homes.

The animals escaped on at 1pm on Wednesday from the Alpha Genesis lab that tests experimental drugs and vaccines for various infectious diseases and disorders.

Police have deployed traps and thermal cameras around the town in an attempt to catch the monkey, but none had been captured as of 11am this morning — with efforts being hampered by rain.

Officers have also said there is 'no health risk' to the public.

It comes after three primates escaped from a vehicle carrying them to the lab in 2022 following a road accident. 

A monkey also escaped from the same center in 2016 after its cage was not properly locked.

One local resident said on X, formerly Twitter: 'The monkeys escape from Yemassee every year. That s*** happens every year! The workers forget to lock up the cages and they go crazy!'

The facility says online that it works with both macaque and capuchin monkeys.

Revealing the escape, the local sheriff Department said on Facebook: 'Residents are strongly advised to keep doors and windows secured to prevent these animals from entering homes.

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'If you spot any of the escaped animals, please contact 911 immediately and refrain from approaching them.'

The primates were housed in a facility on Castle Road in the town of Yemassee.

A local official told DailyMail.com that the monkeys that escaped were 'very young females' that weigh approximately 6 to 7lbs.

They had never been used for testing due to their young age, they said, and are described as 'skittish' and that 'any additional noise or movement could hinder their safe capture'.

Alpha Genesis CEO Greg Westergaard told WSAV that the monkeys escaped after a worker left their enclosure door open while it was being cleaned. 

They are also rhesus macaques, a brown or greyish monkey with distinctive pink faces that are native to South, Central and Southeast Asia.

In the wild, they live in a variety of habitats including forests, grasslands and urban areas.

Alpha Genesis also runs another center for housing monkeys on Morgan Island, just off the coast of South Carolina. 

Overall, it houses more than 5,000 monkeys at any given time which are used in clinical research.

In June 2018, Alpha Genesis was fined $12,000 by the federal government over six violations — four of which involved animals escaping from the facility.

The first occasion was in 2014, when 26 monkeys escaped and were on the loose for 48 hours. Just a week later a single monkey escaped and was never found.

Two more monkeys escaped six months later and then one died from internal injuries that occurred after it was shot with a dart during its recapture.

And in 2016, another monkey escaped because its cage was secured with a clip rather than a lock.

There were also two other violations, including one monkey being placed in the wrong social group, leading to it being attacked and suffering from fatal internal injuries, and an incident where at least six monkeys suffered from severe dehydration.