{"id":140502,"date":"2018-06-13T09:31:09","date_gmt":"2018-06-13T09:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/english\/minnesota-raccoon-hailed-as-hero-after-skyscraper-climb\/"},"modified":"2018-06-13T09:31:09","modified_gmt":"2018-06-13T09:31:09","slug":"minnesota-raccoon-hailed-as-hero-after-skyscraper-climb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/english\/minnesota-raccoon-hailed-as-hero-after-skyscraper-climb\/","title":{"rendered":"Minnesota raccoon hailed as hero after skyscraper climb"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"AImage copyright Evan Frost\/ MPR News
Image caption The animal has been scaling the UBS building since Tuesday as crowds watch on <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A daredevil raccoon in St Paul, Minnesota, has had the internet on tenterhooks after scaling 23 floors of a building for nearly a day.<\/p>\n

The critter, dubbed #MPRraccoon after the radio station opposite the high-rise, is trending worldwide on Twitter.<\/p>\n

Crowds gathered at the building after he went viral, and local media streamed his perilous climb to the world. <\/p>\n

Twitter celebrated as the animal reached the roof at 03:00am (07:00 BST) where cat food inside a trap awaits.<\/p>\n

It had been descending the building for hours before that, as an anxious audience watched on into the night. <\/p>\n

Evan Frost and Tim Nelson, journalists with Minnesota Public Radio (MPR), have been documenting the raccoon's journey on Twitter.<\/p>\n

Image copyright Tim Nelson\/ MPR News
Image caption Watchers were concerned for the animal's welfare, and feared he needed food and water <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

"One of my colleagues spotted the raccoon on, kind of the ground floor, sitting on a ledge on Monday - it looked like a brown lump, almost like a cat sitting there," Evan Frost told the BBC in the early hours of Wednesday. <\/p>\n

"We went out there at about 8:30 on Tuesday morning and saw it was a raccoon. Two workers in the building got out a couple of long planks - sort of making a kind of ladder for it."<\/p>\n

But that initial rescue failed - and ended up scaring the animal upwards. <\/p>\n

Image Copyright @efrostee @efrostee Report<\/a><\/noindex> <\/figure>\n
\"TwitterImage Copyright @efrostee @efrostee Report<\/a><\/noindex> <\/figure>\n

It spent much of Tuesday going up and down the building's floors, occasionally napping on ledges. <\/p>\n

"It was heartbreaking to see yesterday," Tim Nelson told the BBC on Wednesday. "We couldn't imagine how this would end well for him".<\/p>\n

Raccoons are common in the US, but are usually found in alleys or riffling through rubbish bins - leading to the common animal nickname "trash panda". <\/p>\n

"I was talking to a wildlife expert yesterday who said there might be a dozen or two dozen of these raccoons in every square mile here in Minnesota - they're everywhere. But you don't see them scaling office towers," Mr Nelson said. <\/p>\n

Image copyright Tony Nelson\/ MPR News
Image caption The building's windows were sealed, and local fire officials said it was too dangerous to attempt a human rescue <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Both men were overwhelmed by the global reaction to their posts about the raccoon's ascent. <\/p>\n

"I think it just seems like something a lot of different people can get behind," Mr Frost told the BBC.<\/p>\n

"It's kind of absurd that I took a couple of pictures of an animal that people usually hate and think is disgusting, and all of a sudden it has thousands of retweets and likes."<\/p>\n

Mr Nelson grew up in a town called Coon Rapids, named after the mammals. <\/p>\n

"To think that one of these little animals would top the trending on twitter is a complete surprise to me," he said.<\/p>\n

Image copyright Evan Frost\/ MPR News
Image caption Crowds gathered throughout Tuesday day and overnight at the scene <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Image copyright Tony Nelson\/MPR News
Image caption One woman, called Maria Lucia, brought binoculars, and said she was worried about the animal on Tuesday <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Both men laughed when asked if they had managed to get any work done during raccoon-watch. <\/p>\n

Although the animal was filmed reaching the top shortly before 03:00 local time - its fate won't be fully known until animal services get up to check the traps set on the roof in the morning.<\/p>\n

The animal has become an unlikely hero for many on twitter - with users dubbing his unlikely success an inspiration. <\/p>\n

James Gunn, who directed Hollywood film Guardians of the Galaxy, which featured a hero raccoon, at one point on Tuesday offered to donate $1,000 (\u00a3750) to charity in the name of anyone who was able to save the #MPRraccoon. <\/p>\n

A Twitter account in the animal's name already has over 2,500 followers - and users online have made fan-art and even toys of the animal. <\/p>\n

Image Copyright @stribrooks @stribrooks Report<\/a><\/noindex> <\/figure>\n
\"TwitterImage Copyright @stribrooks @stribrooks Report<\/a><\/noindex> <\/figure>\n

Skip Twitter post by @eugenegu <\/p>\n

\n

Nevertheless, it persisted. #mprraccoon pic.twitter.com\/wjPTbn7ZVS<\/p>\n

\u2014 Eugene Gu, MD (@eugenegu) June 13, 2018<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Report <\/p>\n

End of Twitter post by @eugenegu<\/p>\n

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    Image copyright Evan Frost\/ MPR NewsImage caption The animal has been scaling the UBS building since Tuesday as crowds watch on A daredevil raccoon in St Paul, Minnesota, has had<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":140503,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-140502","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140502","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140502"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140502\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/140503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140502"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140502"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140502"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}