Stockholm’s Skansen Zoo was evacuated Saturday after a sly serpent, specifically a king cobra nicknamed Houdini, slithered out of the zoo’s terrarium through a light fixture.
As of this morning, he was still at large, although zoo officials believe they know where is is hiding—in the ceiling of the area housing the terrarium that is his regular habitat. On Saturday, they started the hunt by spreading flour on floors to see if that would reveal the snake’s slithery path, but that tactic failed.
As of Monday morning, officials were still trying to recover the reptile, which they now believe is in a back room, far from the public viewing area.
Zoo official Jonas Wahlstrom told press that “It’s not in the visitor area, but behind the scenes. It’s cooler there and it’s lying there and resting. It takes time to find a snake.” Among the tactics in use, he said, “we’ve put out some dead rats which might tempt him to return.”
UPDATE
The snake is back.
The cobra that slithered out of his terrarium through a lamp fixture had been in hiding in various parts of the zoo building for more than a week when he apparently decided enough was enough and crawled back home.
Even after he was located in the building ceiling, he repeatedly escaped capture, despite x-ray and other devices deployed by Customs personnel. The snake kept moving; at one point his head appeared in a place where workers had opened the wall, but then disappeared again.
Originally named Sir Vass, or Sir Hiss, his escaped earned the new nickname Houdini.