Last week, a video went viral, another slap on the window from a gorilla at Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo. The man on the other side of the glass didn't move or blink. He was clam and stoic.
Who would be so calm?
Tim and Amanda Briggs would. Part of the reason for that calmness, they know these animals. Starting last April,the Briggs made the trip down from Des Moines. It began something they kept doing.
"Sometimes its weekly, sometimes it's twice a week," said Amanda Briggs.
It's all to see the gorillas at the zoo. They've taken more than a hundred vides, and have spend hundreds more hours. Sometimes, the couple says the gorillas follow them around. In other videos, they interact, grabbing clips of grass and showing their teeth through the glass Amanda.
"He flirts!" she said.
Towards Tim, the behavior is more aggressive. Slapping the glass, beating their chest. He says he never provokes them. He thinks it's because he's 6'3''.
"I am a big guy. I am probably intimidating to them. They want to show they are bigger and badder," he said.
The couple has visited other zoos and other animals, but they say they always come back to Omaha and to their particular pals with opposable thumbs.
"They're beautiful. I mean they are strong, they're majestic. How can you not see that if you sit and observe them and really watch them and not just smack the window once and hope for a reaction for a second?" Amanda said.
