Pongo The Giraffe Walks Tall Again After Risky Procedure: WATCH

MIAMI, FL — Standing more than 16 feet tall and weighing close to 2,000 pounds, Pongo the giraffe can now walk tall again thanks to a risky procedure at ZooMiami that saved his life.

"He’s walking like he’s never had a fracture at all," Ron Magill of ZooMiami told Patch on Tuesday. "It’s fantastic."

A team of two dozen veterinarians, technicians, zookeepers and farriers reshaped Pongo's fractured foot and fitted him for corrective shoes Saturday, all while the gentle giant was kept under anesthesia.

"Basically, what we did was we had a special farrier — a guy who basically is a horse shoer but for exotic animals — restructure his foot, reshape his foot, and then build a special rubber shoe, kind of like giraffe orthotics, that would then adhere to his foot, and basically change his gait and isolate and stabilize the fracture, because you can’t put a cast on a giraffe."

The procedure was dangerous for Pongo and unwieldy for the team of experts who took X-rays, trimmed Pongo's hooves, shaped and attached the custom rubber shoes, performed laser therapy on Pongo and collected blood and tissue samples.

Magill said adult giraffes are considered to be one of the most challenging animals to anesthetize.

"It’s the first time we have ever done it, and it is very rarely done," said Magill, the public face of the largest zoological garden in Florida and one of the largest in the country. "It is not uncommon that the giraffe never survives once you anesthetize it. That’s why it’s a last-ditch effort."

Magill said Pongo's quality of life had been declining since he suffered the foot fracture, making it painful for him to go about his daily routine.

"It’s like when a horse breaks a bone in a leg, they usually end up euthanizing the horse," Magill explained. "Now put that in perspective with a giraffe. It’s a much larger animal, much larger legs. So when you have a foot fracture like that, it’s potentially catastrophic."

Pongo’s head had to be kept elevated on a special board while he was under anesthesia. Animal science staff constantly massaged his neck and body to help the animal's blood flowing.

Magill said everyone on the team collectively held their breath as Pongo was given the drugs to wake him up.

While he was able to hold his head up relatively quickly, it took him nearly 40 minutes to stand again, a sign that the procedure was successful.

Pongo, an 11-year-old reticulated giraffe, may live as long as 18 to 22 years now that he has undergone the procedure in what is essentially midlife.

"Those shoes will stay on forever," predicted Magill, who painstakingly documented Pongo's medical procedure with photos and video.

"It’s a great feel-good story of something that had a very high potential of going very wrong and fortunately everything went right," Magill added. "It was a textbook procedure."

Watch Pongo's procedure below courtesy of ZooMiami: