Leopard spotted on Hyderabad international airport premises, officials scrutinise CCTV footage

HYDERABAD: A leopard was sighted on the premises of the Hyderabad international airport at Shamshabad in the city's suburbs late on Sunday night.

Early on Monday, officials of the forest department visited the airport to analyse CCTV footage in which the animal could be seen moving and also to look for any signs like pug marks left behind by the leopard.

As per sources in the forest department, the leopard was spotted on Sunday night at two places in the airport -- near the cargo area and near the runway.

CCTV footage from the airport shows the big cat moving along a boundary wall and then leaping over it. The big cat is expected to have travelled towards an adjacent locality named Rasheedguda.

While the Telangana forest department has not yet officially confirmed the sighting of the leopard, the video footage clearly shows the animal.

In October last year, a leopard moving in and around the Shamshabad forest range was captured by the forest department near the Water and Land Management Training and Research Institute (WALAMTARI) campus near Rajendranagar and later released far away inside the Amrabad Tiger Reserve.

Forest department officials said that while wild boar and other small mammals have been sighted at the airport, this is probably the first time a leopard has been sighted here.