Now you see the moose, now you don’t.
A driver in Alberta, Canada recently used their camera to capture a bit of a disappearing act. It looks like they got their phone out while behind the wheel (important to note that it’s not safe to record and drive) because they noticed a sizable bull moose running along the side of the road. They got up next to it with their car, matching the wild animal’s speed, and they were astounded to see that the big ol’ moose was easily keeping up with the vehicle.
In case you didn’t know, moose are the largest of all deer that are in the deer family, and their height and weight might surprise you. Males are typically bigger than females, though both genders are generally ginormous (that’s my preferred adjective when detailing a moose’s size). On average, a bull moose usually stands at 6 feet tall at their shoulders, and can even weigh up to 1,400 big
So that’s a whole lot of mass that they are able to get moving at high speeds.
Moose are able to run up to 35 miles per hour, and much of that is thanks to their long legs. That top speed is usually just for short bursts – when they really need to get a move on – but as you’ll see in this video, it certainly appears that this bull was maintaining sprint speed for a very impressive amount of time. And the animal was making it look easy, might I add.
Generally, if they need to get somewhere fast, moose will set the cruise control at about 20 miles per hour. That’s no problem at all for moose to maintain for long distances, and this one was really chugging along… until the ground fell out from underneath it. I’m not exactly sure what happened, but the moose evidently didn’t see the water hazard (for a lack of a better term) coming up on the path ahead.
In a comical instant, the moose went from being level with the roadway to splashing down in the water and completely disappearing. And it had to have been a sizable body of water, because it fully engulfed the animal in a matter of seconds. Just goes to show that you always have to keep your head on a swivel when you are running with it wide open.
Unexpected hazards can pop up out of nowhere… just ask this moose.
The video cuts off right after the big time splashdown, so we don’t know for sure how the moose recovered from this. My fingers are crossed that it didn’t sprain an ankle or bang one of its knees up too bad (I’d imagine lower leg injuries for moose would be troublesome). Hopefully the worst it had to deal with afterwards was a little embarrassment and a lot of water-soaked fur.
Oh, and if I were you, I’d turn the sound up when you press play. The splash sound pairs perfectly with what sounds like two, audible gasps coming from the vehicle:
“Buddy’s been doing cold plunges before they were cool.”
