April 6, 2026, 2:54 p.mApril 6, 2026, 2:54 p.m
The wolf captured after an attack on a woman a week ago in the middle of Hamburg in northern Germany is free again. The male cub was equipped with a transmitter and released back into the wild on Easter Sunday.
People demonstrated for the wolf.Image: IMAGO / BREUEL-BILD
The Hamburg environmental authority announced this on Monday. The authority did not say exactly where the wolf was released. The animal had been in a wildlife sanctuary near Sachsenhagen in the Schaumburg district of Lower Saxony since Tuesday.
Fegebank: “It’s a parole release”
“By releasing this wolf into the wild, we have now found a legally secure solution that takes into account the safety of citizens and animal welfare,” explained Hamburg’s Environment Senator Katharina Fegebank. The transmitter ensures that the animal’s location is known at all times and that hunters can intervene immediately in case of doubt, for example if it approaches a settlement again. “It’s a parole release,” said the senator.
The wolf was first spotted in the west of the city on the last weekend in March. The following Monday evening (March 30th) he ran into a small shopping arcade on Grosse Bergstrasse in the Altona district and injured an approximately 60-year-old woman there. The wolf then ran for several kilometers through downtown Hamburg and finally jumped into the Inner Alster, where the police were able to catch him.
Discussion about whether the wolf bit the woman
The environmental agency assumes that the wolf bit the woman when she allegedly approached the panicked animal to let it outside through the automatic glass doors of the shopping arcade. Environment Senator Fegebank referred to the police report on Tuesday. However, what exactly is in the report is unknown because the police are not releasing it.
Conservationists doubt that the wolf attacked and bit the woman. For example, they refer to a witness who claims to have seen that the wolf jumped at the woman but did not bite her. The textile dealer with her own shop in the passage told the “Hamburger Abendblatt”: “It looked more as if the wolf had hit her in the face with his paw when it pounced.”
Vigil at Jungfernstieg
According to the organizers, around 150 animal lovers campaigned for the animal’s release at a vigil on Hamburg’s Jungfernstieg on Easter Sunday. Observers estimated the number to be closer to 100. Some of them brought their dogs with them, others carried signs that read “Let him back to his freedom,” “I am not a trophy,” or “The wolf should stay.” The wolf was fished out of the Inner Alster by the police at that point. (hkl/sda/dpa)