Moose wanders into Alaskan hospital

It's probably the last thing anyone expected to see last Sunday on their way into Anchorage's Providence Alaska Medical Center: a moose standing in the hallway. It's a first for the hospital, said Ginger Houghton, a community relations specialist at Providence. From time to time, moose do show up inside the parking garage, but never before had she heard of one making its way inside the building.



And this particular moose broke another record: Before its weekend adventure came to an end, it had managed to saunter all the way up to the third floor of the parking garage of the hospital. Because angry, agitated moose can be dangerous, this problem moose quickly garnered its own private security. Hospital security staff was diverted to keep eyes on the moose and people away. Even so, “the moose was never a nuisance,” said Houghton, adding that the hospital complex frequently has moose on its campus.


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It's thought the moose triggered an automatic set of doors that detects approaching pedestrians. Once the doors opened, it walked right into the building. The hospital is quick to point out that the moose made it through some but not all of the various security doors, adding that it was never actually inside the main hallway. Three sets of double doors separate the main hospital from the parking garage on the first level, and the moose never made it through the third set, instead getting caught in a foyer area.



Security staff disabled the automatic doors so it wouldn't happen again, shooing the moose back through the middle doors, and eventually out the first set of doors and back into the parking garage. Signs were posted at hospital entrances warning of a moose in the area. In the days that followed, the moose was spotted eating bushes on the second floor of the parking garage and hanging out by the doors on the third floor. Houghton estimates the moose was physically inside the parking garage for about three days, and said it has since made its way back to ground level safe and unharmed.