Swedish schoolchildren were surprised on Monday by an unexpected visitor in their classroom – an elk calf. The junior high students at Sörgårdsskolan, in Mölndal western Sweden fled to an adjoining room.
The elk wasn’t happy when it got trapped in the evacuated classroom, according to The Local.
“The elk felt cloistered in there in the confined space,” said regional police spokesman Thomas Fuxborg. “So when the children has locked themselves into the adjoining paint supply room, they could hear the elk butting windows and doors to get out.”
Police officers broke a window to get the children out safely, and the spokesman said nobody was hurt.
Apparently, elk wander into civilization in Sweden from time to time. Over the years, elk have walked into a home for the elderly, entered backyards and gotten drunk on fermented apples.
But elk break-ins are rare, Fuxborg said.
“I’ve worked up here for 10 years and only once has an elk entered a building,” he said. “That time it was a shoe store, or maybe a clothes store.
Fuxbord said this particular elk was panicked, and his colleagues put it down.
“It was stressed, it was in a state,” he said. “It could have hurt someone.”