Rosemarie Keough had decided to get up close and personal with a penguin at her local aquarium. She was writing an article for The Gazette on the aquarium’s mother penguin and her egg, and she had wanted a photo to accompany the piece.

After the ‘O.K.’ from the aquarium’s manager, Rosemarie got the permission needed for her to enter the enclosure. Once inside, the worker accompanying her, Robert Clarke, stepped out for a minute to get some food for the mother penguin.

When the worker left, Rosemarie crouched down and readied her camera to take a picture of the loving mother penguin and her egg.

Mid-crouch, the mother’s head snapped toward the lens. Not missing a moment, Rosemarie captured the picture. As the click of the camera sounded out through the exhibit, what was meant to be a caring mother turned into a rabid beast. It started running, or waddling, toward Rosemarie, shrieking at the top of its lungs.

While screaming, Rosemarie jumped up on her feet and started to run in the opposite direction from the penguin.

“I didn’t know what else to do,” Rosemarie later exclaimed. “I just saw it charging towards me and my instinct told me to run.”

As she ran away from the furious penguin, a crowd gathered outside the enclosure and started to watch Rosemarie. The audience couldn’t restrain their laughter while the distressed woman ran for her life in the enclosure.

When Robert and some staff finally came to the rescue, they found a distraught Rosemarie and a defensive mother.

“An overprotective mother gone wild!” Robert Clarke had laughed.

Rosemarie Keough left the aquarium that day with a photo of a mother penguin, about 4 nips on her legs from a crazy animal, and a memory she would never forget.