SINGAPORE – Mr Eric Teo and his friends were cycling in the Lorong Halus area in the dead of the night on March 19 when they noticed an animal foraging at the edge of the forested area.
“It’s my first time seeing a tapir in the wild,” the 28-year-old freelancer said, adding that he then slowed down to observe the rare animal after realising what he had chanced upon.
The Malayan tapir is found mainly in the Malay peninsula, with numbers estimated to be under 3,000.
It is classified as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, which means it is at high risk of going extinct in the wild.
“It felt like a once in a lifetime opportunity. I understand the animal’s rarity, and I joked with my friends that spotting a tapir in the wild is rarer than striking lottery,” said Mr Teo, adding that the sighting was at about 2am. The tapir was about the size of half a car, according to Mr Teo.
He declined to give the exact location of the sighting, as he does not wish to see people camp out to spot the tapir, which may disturb the animal.
Mr Teo had shared a video on Facebook of the tapir, which has since garnered over 23,000 views and over 700 reactions. In the video, the tapir can be seen grazing a grass patch along the road before trotting off into the forest.
“I was across the road from the tapir, and kept a distance of about 50m away,” Mr Teo said, adding that he did not wish to spook the animal.
NParks previously said that tapir sightings here are rare, with one in February in the Defu industrial area near Paya Lebar.
There were also tapir sightings in Pulau Ubin in 2024 and late 2025, as well as in Lorong Halus in 2023.
NParks previously said that members of the public should remain calm and quiet, and to avoid making any sudden movements, if they encounter a tapir.
They should not try to approach or feed the animal, or to provoke it, such as by using flash photography, the board added.