First it was Cows with Guns....
now beware of Chooks with bombs!
Bomb squad destroys wired-up rooster
09 June 2003
By SUE ALLEN
A rooster has been shot dead after an hour's standoff with police and bomb disposal experts in Christchurch.
The rooster, which had two canisters with wires poking out of them taped under its wings, was seen by a member of the public wandering around Sydenham yesterday morning.
Senior Sergeant Ian Freeman of Christchurch police said that, when officers saw the "tooled up" bird, they took matters "a little seriously" and cornered it in a driveway before evacuating the house and calling in the bomb squad.
Bomb disposal experts tried to X-ray the bird from a distance to determine if it was just a prank. They were uncertain, so it was shot.
"(The rooster) has been put down and the contents of the canisters were found to be harmless," Mr Freeman said.
"It was unfortunate for him, but we have to sort things like this out. We could have taken a light-hearted view and someone could have lost an arm or a leg."
The incident might sound like a joke, he said, but police had wasted three hours.
SPCA spokesman Hans Kriek said police could have tried to handle the situation so the bird survived. The rooster's fate should be a lesson to people playing practical jokes with animals.
