Daya the orangutan at Auckland Zoo. Photo: Auckland Zoo / Twitter
Auckland Zoo says an orangutan which set off its fire sprinkler system, outsmarted its 'tamper-proof' alarm.
Eleven-year-old Daya inadvertently set off the fire alarm inside the area of the South East Asia Jungle Track high canopy habitat in late August.
That caused the sprinklers to activate and led to the Fire and Emergency New Zealand attending the zoo within minutes and disabling the alarm and sprinklers.
Auckland Zoo Deputy Curator of Mammals Amy Robbins said the alarm was designed to withstand tampering - from humans at least.
"All she did was just pop the protective covering off one of the sprinkler heads which then activated the system," Robbins said.
"You can say something is tamper-proof and it absolutely is, for humans, but when you're talking about orangutans it's an entirely different story.
"She just used her fingers, they're very, very strong, at least eight times stronger than us."
Thanks to the fire crew's quick response, Robbins said the alarm meant there was, "a lot of water and a lot of noise everywhere but [it] was very short-lived".
When asked what Daya did with alarms ringing and water sprinkling the enclosure, Robbins said she, "sat still and didn't really do a lot".
The natural curiosity of the animals actually made the designing of their enclosures "one of the most challenging" out of all the species, she said.
"Nothing is ever going to be completely orangutan-proof because they are naturally curious, they are tool-users."
She said the fire alarm pulling at least gave them a great opportunity.
"It's actually really good to know our system works so well."
Auckland Zoo said it would look into how it could prevent the same incident from happening again.