Authorities announced today that there was "no acute danger" to residents of the wider Berlin suburbs where a potentially dangerous animal was spotted, saying they no longer believed it was an escaped lioness.
The search showed no traces of such an animal, and experts who analyzed the footage concluded that it might have been a wild boar.
Police were first alerted to the animal just outside Berlin's city limits around midnight on Wednesday, when people reported what appeared to be a large cat chasing a wild boar.
The police initially concluded that it was a lioness. But the animals proved elusive during a search in the flat, wooded area on the border between Berlin and the surrounding state of Brandenburg. Today, the police found only a family of wild boars.
The police thoroughly combed the forest today and found no evidence of a lioness, or any wild animals other than the wild boars that are common in this area, Kleinmachnow mayor Michael Grubert told reporters.
Officials also called in experts to analyze the footage, and two experts independently concluded that "this is not a lioness or similar wild animal" and that the creature "looks more like a wild boar," Grubert said.
"We will return to the usual vigilance program and we think there is no acute danger for Kleinmachn or for south Berlin," the mayor said.
Grubert defended the 36-hour operation, which used helicopters, drones and infrared cameras and involved veterinarians and hunters, as "appropriate".
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