It’s not a situation that anyone would expect to find themselves in, but one truck driver avoided catastrophe by taking an unprecedented risk while on a family vacation to the zoo.

When it comes to zoos, certain animals’ escape is more of an annoyance than a risk.

For example, if a capybara escapes, it appears to be more likely to gain some pets than to pose a threat to safety.

Other creatures, on the other hand, are a different story.

Tigers, tigers, and bears are all plainly dangerous to humans, but one animal that may be terrible for entirely other reasons is a chimp.

Despite chimps’ reputation for unpredictability and hostility, Rick Swope jumped into an enclosure when he sensed that one chimp’s life was in grave danger.

Jo-Jo, the chimp in question, was a resident of the Detroit Zoo.

Jo-Jo had gotten into a battle with another male in the enclosure in 1990. Jo-Jo had leaped into a deep moat encircling the cage as a consequence of the brawl, which was designed to keep him and the other chimps in.

Chimpanzees, while excellent climbers are not adept swimmers.

They can sink because they have minimal body fat and a top-heavy shape with massive shoulders, making it difficult for them to keep their heads above water.

All of this meant that Jo-Jo was struggling to remain afloat, forcing Swope to disregard the zookeeper’s advice and rush into the water to save him.

”It was the most pathetic thing I ever witnessed,” Swope told the Chicago Tribune at the time.

”This monkey has his hands raised and his head protruding from the water. He was staring out into the throng. It was as though he expected someone to come and save him.

”I was hoping that someone else would do it. But when no one did, I knew I’d go home and kick myself in the buttocks.”

Finally, the truck driver was able to pull Jo-Jo from the water, putting his own safety in jeopardy at the hands of the other chimps.

Swope also described how, after reintroducing Jo-Jo to land, he ‘got the heck out of there’ when another monkey came, fangs bared.

The Tribune claimed at the time that he was quite humble and even ’embarrassed’ by the attention he received after saving the monkey.

”It was no big thing, you know,” Swope said. It wasn’t all that difficult. It didn’t require a special individual to accomplish it. I couldn’t have done it if it had.”