Anxious but amused workers raced in vain trying to catch a calf that ran for her life away from a slaughterhouse on Tuesday afternoon.
The young cow escaped a vehicle just outside a slaughterhouse located in Canarsie, Brooklyn in New York.
And thanks to her courage, the butchery decided to spare the four-month-old's life and take her to a sanctuary to live a happy life with other animals.
A video from the scene shows panicked workers running behind the calf, trying to lasso her as she bravely fled.
The calf was first spotted near East 96th Street and Avenue L., and it took a few minutes for the calf to be rounded up again and placed back into the vehicle.
An onlooker, Vincent Fontana told ABC News: "The people from the slaughterhouse, they were trying to lasso it and get it into the truck, but she was feisty, she didn't want to go."
The calf initially went back to the slaughterhouse a few blocks away, but there was a public outcry that she should be spared.
Mike Stura, who runs the Skylands Animal Sanctuary in New Jersey, called the slaughterhouse to request the cow's release to his sanctuary.
The slaughterhouse reportedly was hesitant but later agreed to give the cow to the sanctuary.
Mr Stura said, that there's something about the one animal that fights to survive that people identify with.
He told ABC News: "Even slaughterhouse workers over the years that have given me animals, much bigger animals than this one, and have taken a much bigger financial hit and have said to me that they're happy the animal came with me.
"They are happy to see one live. You know, even the people in the slaughterhouses."
Mr Fontana added: "I think she deserves it. I think she earned it."
It comes just a few weeks after seven sheep run off from a slaughterhouse in Paterson, New Jersey.
After roaming on the streets the sheep were eventually captured, but, similarly to the calf, animal control officers decided to give them a chance at life.
"They'll be quarantined," a worker at Skylands Animal Sanctuary and Rescue in Wantage told Eyewitness News at the time.
"The vet will come and check them, and he'll give them the okay, whatever they need, any vaccines, anything. And then they'll join our forty-three other sheep with their own nice big barn."
