Russians questioned over parachuting donkey

Pic in link

[link to www.telegraph.co.uk]

Attached to a parachute, the animal screamed in fear as it circled over heads of holidaymakers sunbathing on a beach in the Cossack village of Golubitskaya in the Krasnodar region of Russia last week.

A regional police spokeswoman said the donkey ended up in the skies as a result of an impromptu advertising campaign by several Russian entrepreneurs to attract beachgoers to their private beach.

Instead, they attracted the attention of regional police who learned of the flying donkey earlier this week and launched a probe.

"The donkey screamed and children cried," Larisa Tuchkova, regional police spokeswoman, said. "No one had the brains to call police."

Instead, she said, people reached for their cameras and bombarded a local newspaper with phone calls.

The donkey was dragged several metres along the water on landing, after which the animal was pulled out half-alive on to the shore.