Wily coyote rehabilitated

NEW YORK (CNN) -- A coyote was captured Wednesday morning in New York's Central Park after a prolonged chase that ended with the animal being tranquilized by sharpshooters from the Police Department's emergency services unit.

The animal was apprehended near Belvedere Castle, home of the annual Shakespeare in the Park theater series in the heart of the 843-acre park, at about 9:45 a.m., police said.
That was after the coyote gave pursuers the slip in the Hallett Nature Sanctuary near Wollman Rink, in the park's south end. It jumped into a pond, swam under a bridge, squeezed through a fence and raced away.

New York Parks and Recreation Commissioner Adrian Benepe told reporters at the scene, "We have the coyote cornered, but it remains elusive."

The coyote, nicknamed Hal, sparked pandemonium when it darted out of the wooded area and skirted Wollman Rink, where people were ice skating.

Police officers, rangers and sharpshooters -- as well as news camera operators and news helicopters flying overhead -- chased the coyote at a frantic pace before losing track of it.

The ice rink was briefly evacuated to get skaters out of a possible line of fire.
By Tuesday night, police and rangers had chased the animal into the preserve.

"Coyotes are native to New York state, and their habitat is rapidly expanding," Benepe told reporters Wednesday morning.

"This one probably came down through the wooded section of Riverdale in the Bronx, then crossed into Manhattan, where it probably went the length of Riverside Park," which spans Manhattan's west side, before entering Central Park.

He speculated the animal possibly swam across a river to reach the island of Manhattan. It was first seen at 1:30 a.m. Sunday and wrongly identified as a wolf, according to the parks department.

Police "did such a skillful job of tracking the animal over 20 hours and tranquilizing it in the most humane way," Benepe said in a statement.

Officials said the healthy animal was about a year old and was the second coyote spotted in Central Park in seven years.

Police sources said the coyote is being transferred to a wildlife facility in upstate New York, where it will be "rehabilitated."