HONOLULU -- Zoo Director Manny Mollinedo faced his first tsunami after only three months on the job. During that emergency, the zoo lost one of its animals: a llama.

The administrator had faced the wildfires when he worked at the Los Angeles Zoo, but never a water event like this, with a possible 6-foot tidal wave.

The urban zoo in is the inundation zone, and Mollinedo praised how his experienced staff sprang into action implementing the emergency plan. It involved everything from removing generators and computers which contain all the animals' records, to collecting medicines and raising equipment off the ground.

Mollinedo recalled what ran though his head when he left the zoo at 2:30 a.m. on Friday,

“There was an uneasy feeling, because you didn’t know if this was the last time you'd see the zoo looking the way it did,” Mollinedo said.

He said the animals could sense the unusual activity that night.There was increased traffic around the zoo as people were trying to get out of Waikiki. Many people were walking past the animal pens to get further inland.

The zoo director said he felt that the animals were particularly agitated at the sirens that blared for hours thoughout the night, as well as by the loudspeakers used by Honolulu police to warn people to get off the streets and move to high floors in buildings.

“There was a lot of commotion going on, because of that, you could hear the chimpanzees and the lions roaring. The animals sensed something going on,” Mollinedo recalled.

He said when staff returned Friday morning they found that they had lost an elderly llama.

“My vets had been working on the llama for some time, but I think her time was just due. It was unfortunate that she passed away,” said Mollinedo.

The llama was one of two at the children’s petting zoo. Mollinedo said his staff did what they could to secure the animals to avoid any escapes, since moving them is not an option.

“Remember, these are not circus animals. They are not trained, they are wild animals and the stress of moving them could seriously endanger their lives, or the lives of my keepers," said Mollinedo.

Zoo staff have a plan to work with police in the event the animals get loose in an urban setting. Public safety is a priority, and that may require using weapons to capture or take the animals down.

“You want to make sure it doesn’t happen, but if it does happen you have to be prepared,” Mollinedo said.

The new zoo director will be sitting down with staff to go over what could have been done to improve their response to the tsunami threat.

Mollinedo said one area he sees would be to improve communication with the public. The facility was closed, since staff had to work to normalize operations, and the staff was innundated with calls from people who planned to visit.