A huge rat the ‘size of a customer’s foot’ was captured on camera brazenly dashing about McDonald’s in Notting Hill, leaving diners screaming as it scuttled around their feet.
Appalling footage shared on Twitter shows the rodent scampering along the McDonald’s floor before taking shelter behind an oblivious diner’s chair.
Shocked customers could be heard screaming in the background, before finally crowding around the unexpected visitor to take pictures and videos.
Luke Scott had visited McDonald’s in Notting Hill Gate, London, yesterday as he was craving a vanilla milkshake.
The 48-year-old was about to leave after learning the milkshake machine was broken when he heard a scream of terror so loud that he thought the restaurant was being robbed.
Instead, Luke was in for a surprise when he spotted a big rat the length of his foot that was confidently scuttling around the fast food outlet’s floor right by customers’ feet.
Luke, who works in the media, claims the rat-induced panic resulted in McDonald’s staff evacuating customers from the restaurant two minutes later and temporarily closing down the store.
The father of two claims that the body of the rodent was huge and that its size left him in no doubt that it was a rat and not a mouse.
Luke, who lives locally in Notting Hill, said that he walked in and went to the self-service machines to try and get a milkshake, but the milkshake machine wasn’t working. He said that he was about to turn and leave, and then somebody shouted loudly and he thought that it might be a robbery.
He said that he looked around and a couple of people were jumping up and then somebody shouted ‘rat, rat’. He said that he just saw it run across the floor and he felt like people wouldn’t believe it unless they saw it, so he started filming.
He said that it ran towards him, but with other people in the way it stopped and got caught in someone’s bag and feet and then they jumped out of the way, and what was amazing was that it went along the barrier to where someone was sitting, completely oblivious, as she sat there eating her meal and the rat was sat at her feet trying to climb up her chair.
He said that there was a mini-conference going on behind the counter with staff, and then someone who was a bit more senior came forward and said they were closing the store.
Sadly, rats are everywhere, and it probably had nothing to do with the cleanliness of that particular McDonald’s. It was more likely caused by all the rubbish and leftover food from the Carnival that was covering the pavements and roads, and it looks like that rat got left behind after the big cleanup.
It wasn’t a huge rat, it was just a standard rat looking for food. Rats are everywhere, they always have been, but of course, they’re more prevalent where humans litter food, and let’s face it, we have a nasty habit of littering, and the rat was taking advantage of a situation where food had been littered, perhaps it just prefers McDonald’s for a bite to eat!
It was hardly a giant rat and the poor little fella was probably more terrified of all the screaming folk around it. It probably came out for a bit of peace and quiet after the Carnival.
Unfortunately, rats spread diseases and are not suitable for an eating establishment.
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