WASHINGTON — An elementary school in Anne Arundel County closed early Friday because animal control couldn’t catch a feral cat in the building.
A teacher spotted the cat in her classroom at Richard Henry Lee Elementary School around 7:30 a.m. The cat than ran off.
Animal control was called in to hunt for the cat, but Anne Arundel County Public Schools spokesman Bob Mosier says animal control workers weren’t able to find it.
“The cat never came in contact with anyone,” he says.
But the school system didn’t want to take any chances, so the Glen Burnie, Maryland school closed at 9:45 a.m.
“We weren’t going to put 500 students in the path of a potentially ill and very frightened animal,” Mosier says.
Mosier says the children, who were arriving for classes as the search was underway, were kept outside. Parents were notified about what was going on, and the children were sent home.
To catch the cat, animal control officers set three traps and the school system set another three.
The cat had not been caught, as of 11:30 a.m. Friday
Mosier says 14 interior alarms in the school will be set, and the cat will be tracked that way.
“We’ll just continue to narrow down the size of the potential space that it’s in and hopefully get it,” Mosier says.
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