The Skowhegan police chief shot dead a fleeing 600-pound bull believed to have escaped on its way to the slaughterhouse, avoiding capture for an hour-and-a-half before it met its fate, according to the Morning Sentinel.
The bull had crossed into the Kennebec River and was headed toward a crowd of 50 onlookers who gathered to watch the chase when Chief David Bucknam shot the animal around 6 p.m., the paper reported. Fearing for the crowd’s safety, Bucknam told the paper he had no choice but to “put it down.”
The bull made a break from its trailer at 4:30 p.m. near the Quinn Hardware store on Waterville Road, according to the paper. It ran down a maze of streets and then into the woods, before emerging from the trees and making a series of turns before it jumped into the Kennebec River and swam across toward the downtown, the paper reported.
Bucknam shot it when it climbed the riverbank, causing its body to fall back into the water and float downstream, over the dam of a powerstation and toward the Big Eddy River, the paper reported.
Before shooting it, officials reportedly tried to lure the bull back into captivity, but those attempts failed.
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