Article Courtesy New York Daily News
A wily steer turned the street of Queens into a wild west scene Wednesday when he broke out of Halal slaughterhouse and had to be lassoed by cops.
The fleet-footed hoofer made his break from Musa Halal Inc. on Beaver Road, dodging and darting through traffic in a desperate attempt not to become barbecue.
The bolting bovine charged up 109th Ave. in South Jamaica just after 1 p.m. with cops and a butcher in hot pursuit.
Pedestrians and motorists did disbelief double takes, screaming and running as the rampaging livestock rambled through the asphalt jungle.
"I saw this cow running up the street with the police chasing him," said retired bus company owner William Barksdale, 72, of Queens. "I knew the police would eventually win, but he had good spunk."
The break-away beef cut up the driveway of Steven Khan’s house on 109th Ave., startling him and his pals as they were discussing the NBA playoffs in his garage.
"We were chilling. I was coming back, taking out the garbage when I saw my friends running," said Kahn, 20. "I’m like, ‘Why are you running?’"
Then Kahn saw the snorting steer busting throw his backyard gate.
"I ran in the house carrying garbage," he said. "I’m not scared, but it’s a wild cow coming in my yard. It’s not the kind of thing you usually see in South Jamaica."
Khan’s pal Imran Asif, 23, said he jump on the hood of parked truck to avoid being trampled by the stampeding beast.
"When it passed by, I didn’t want it to break my knees and my knees caps," Asif said.
Cops cornered the big brown, moo-moo in Kahn’s yard, shooting it with a tranquilizer gun and lassoing it with ropes.
A butcher from the slaughterhouse tried to help subdue the woozy steer but nearly got head butted.
Stumbling and struggling to not go back to the slaughterhouse, the animal rammed him head into a horse trailer bought to the scene.
At least a dozen cops were required to get the steer into the trailer, witnesses said.
"It was bugging," barber Paul Echols, 23, said of the rawhide escapee. "I was worried. I’m not used to seeing stuff like that."
