Elephant seal causes traffic chaos by repeatedly trying to cross motorway

A “very large, very determined elephant seal” brought traffic to a halt in Sonoma County, California, on Monday when it attempted to cross Highway 37 near Sears Point. At one point, the 500 pound mammal was in the median with cars stopped around it.

The California Highway Patrol tried to help save a 500-pound elephant seal causing traffic on SR 37E/SR 121 in northern California on December 28, 2015.

According to the California Highway Patrol, the seal wandered onto the freeway from a nearby marsh at about 1 p.m, CBS San Francisco reports. If not, a monitor will be standing lookout when the tide comes back in at 3:00 a.m. Tuesday. CHP Officer Andrew Barclay shared he received a face-full of hot breath and saliva while trying corral the extremely irritated mammal back into the sea.

The elephant seal did not seem very pleased with the officers. “So she was moving us pretty easily, a lot of force”. Barclay and the others coaxed her back into the estuary.

Several times the seal was ushered back to the water, only to make a run for the highway again.

Barclay said officers checked on the animal throughout the night, making sure she hadn’t gotten into the roadway. The determined elephant seal made three more attempts.

Wildlife experts were called in after the 226kg mammal was seen trying to climb a wall onto the road in Sonoma. “If she is about to give birth that means she is in her prime”.

Experts with the Marine Mammal Center said the elephant seal might have been trying to reach a field beyond the highway to give birth. The angry elephant seal took a gash out of the wooden board Barclay was holding.

With the guidance of researchers at the Marine Mammal Center, they used boards to coral the seal back towards the water.