Brooklyn's Prospect Park Zoo is welcoming its first guests since devastating flooding back in September.
The zoo has been closed for 239 days, as crews worked to repair exhibits and other infrastructure.
Tropical Storm Ophelia flooded the zoo with as much as 25 feet of water. The 12-acre zoo's 400 animals were OK, but the zoo's infrastructure was on life support.
Cell phone video captured water gushing into the zoo's boiler room. Tropical species that require warm habitats rely on the boiler to run properly. A temporary boiler now sits above ground.
It has cost the zoo about $6.5 million to repair the damage caused by the tropical storm, but building a permanent boiler room and improving mitigation efforts will cost millions more.
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The zoo says there needs to be structural changes to Prospect Park that will allow for stormwater detention. In other words, way to store damaging floodwaters temporarily.
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Visitors returning to the popular zoo or checking out its inhabitants for the first time will be greeted by some new faces.
While the zoo was repairing and rebuilding, the its staff helped welcome a baby baboon.
"This will be the premiere for the youngest infant of ours," Craig Piper, director of City Zoos and Central Park Zoo for the Wildlife Conservation Society, told News 4.
Friday's grand re-opening is limited to WCS members only. The zoo will reopen to the public on Saturday.
