Washington, D.C
Giant Pandas are returning to D.C.’s National Zoo
Giant Panda Tian Tian rests in its enclosure at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 7, 2023, on the final day of viewing before returning to China. All three of the zoo’s pandas left for China, bringing at least a temporary end to a decades-old connection between the cuddly animal and the U.S. capital.
Jim Watson / AFP via Getty Images
Giant pandas have been one of the biggest attractions at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo in Washington, D.C., ever since the first pair arrived in 1972 — a historic token of friendship from communist China.
Now, National Zoo officials say D.C. will get two new adolescent pandas by the end of the year. The last bears departed in November, bound for China on a FedEx cargo plane, with no agreement in place to secure a new pair.
“We’re beyond thrilled,” says Brandie Smith, director of the National Zoo. “The first time I walked through the panda house after the pandas had left, that was a really sad moment. But then we immediately turned our eyes toward the future.”
China has a monopoly on one of the cutest creatures in the animal kingdom — the native range of giant pandas is entirely within the country’s borders. Today, there are roughly 2,000 of the animals lumbering around the bamboo-filled mountains of south central China.
For decades, the Chinese government has gifted or loaned pandas to zoos around the world. It’s a practice that’s been called “panda diplomacy,” and it often coincides with trade deals or other diplomatic events. But as relations have soured in recent years between China and the U.S., China stopped renewing panda loans to U.S. zoos. Atlanta is currently the last zoo in the country to have giant pandas, and they are set to return to China.
Asked whether international relations were at play in the D.C. panda negotiations, Smith said she couldn’t comment. “That’s not really my area of expertise,” she says.
The San Diego Zoo is also set to get a new pair of pandas sometime soon, but no date has been announced.
The 2-year-old bears heading to D.C. are named Bao Li and Qing Bao. Both were born at the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda in Sichuan. Bao Li has D.C. roots, though: His mother, Bao Bao, was born at the National Zoo in 2013 and was a local celebrity before being sent to China in 2017. Bao Li’s grandparents, Tian Tian and Mei Xiang, lived at the National Zoo for 23 years before being returned to China last year.
Male giant panda Xiao Qi Ji walks around his enclosure at the Smithsonian National Zoo on Sept. 23, 2023 in Washington, D.C.
Anna Moneymaker / Getty Images
“We need that panda!”
Mariel Lally, one of the zoo’s panda keepers, traveled with the bears in the FedEx cargo plane last year on their flight back to China. While there, she happened to see Bao Li and immediately noted a resemblance with his grandfather, Tian Tian.
“We were just falling on the floor, we just couldn’t believe how adorable he was. We just kept saying, we need that panda, we need him,” Lally says. “We had no idea it would come to pass.”
At age 2, pandas are considered “sub-adults,” Lally says, comparable to the teenage years in a human lifespan.
“They’re going to be a little cub-like, still really playful, and want to spend a lot of time in the trees playing with toys,” Lally says.
The new panda loan comes with terms similar to previous agreements. The loan has a term of 10 years, though previous loans have often been extended. Any cubs born to the pair will belong to China and must be sent back upon turning 4 years old. The National Zoo will pay $1 million a year to the China Wildlife and Conservation Association in exchange for the pandas, funds that are intended to support research and conservation efforts.
After decades of international efforts to breed pandas and restore habitat, the animals are no longer considered endangered. Giant pandas are now listed as vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Chinese environmental officials.
At the National Zoo, federal funding covers basic expenses like food and medicine for animals, but it doesn’t pay for the panda loan fee or cover the full cost of the panda program. The program has an annual budget of $2.8 million, including the fee. About three-quarters of that budget is funded by donations, zoo memberships and other sales.
About 2 million people visit the National Zoo annually, and for many, the giant pandas have been the first and favorite stop. Smith says there hasn’t been a noticeable decline in visitors since the last pandas departed, but it’s hard to tell because the zoo’s busy season is just now ramping up. And, she says, there are plenty of other animals to see.
“We know our visitors might come for the pandas, but they stay here for everything else,” Smith says.
While the panda habitat has been empty, the zoo has taken the opportunity to upgrade the building and outdoor space. Crews are currently at work building new fences, larger indoor and outdoor platforms, and ponds.
“We want to make sure whatever we put in is going to be sturdy, especially with two young mischievous pandas that are probably going to try to take the whole place apart,” Lally says.
Copyright 2024 NPR
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) – Seventy-two veterans took a trip Saturday to our nation’s capital to visit memorials honoring their service in the armed forces.
This year marks the 12th trip to Washington, D.C. for Honor Flight Tallahassee.
Early Saturday morning, veterans and their guardians met to take a charter flight up to D.C.
Throughout the day, veterans were taken to the World War II memorial, as well as the Korean and Vietnam War memorials. The veterans also visited Arlington National Cemetery and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
More Tallahassee news:
The day ended with a wonderful welcome home celebration.
Our Jacob Murphey, Julia Miller, Taylor Viles, and Grace Temple accompanied the veterans, capturing moments from throughout the day.
The team will have live coverage from Washington, D.C. on Monday to share more from the day’s events.
We will continue to have coverage throughout the month of May, leading up to our Honor Flight special on Memorial Day.
To keep up with the latest news as it develops, follow WCTV on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Nextdoor and X (Twitter).
Have a news tip or see an error? Write to us here. Please include the article’s headline in your message.
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Copyright 2026 WCTV. All rights reserved.
4 things to know about the weather:
- Chances of rain in the morning
- Gusty Sunday
- Chilly Monday
- Temps will rise again through the work week
Download the NBC Washington app on iOS and Android to check the weather radar on the go.
After a nice and warm Saturday, changes arrive for part two of the weekend.
The first half of your Sunday will have a chance for showers. Winds will pick up with our next system and are expected to gust to about 20-30 mph. Cooler air will settle in, and lows Sunday night fall into the 40s.
Highs temps Monday will reach only into the mid to upper 50s.
However, temperatures will rise through the week, so you won’t need your jackets every day.
QuickCast
SUNDAY:
Showers, then partly cloudy
Wind: NW 10-15 mph
Gusts @ 30 mph
HIGH: Lower 60s
MONDAY:
Partly cloudy
Wind: NW 10-15 mph
Gusts @ 25 mph
HIGH: Upper 50s
Stay with Storm Team4 for the latest forecast. Download the NBC Washington app on iOS and Android to get severe weather alerts on your phone.
Washington, D.C
‘It’s a twilight zone’: Iran war casts deep shadows over IMF gathering in Washington
The most severe energy shock since the 1970s, the risk of a global recession and households everywhere stomaching a renewed surge in the cost of living – hitting the most vulnerable hardest.
In a sweltering hot Washington DC this week, the message at the International Monetary Fund meetings was chilling: things had been looking up for living standards around the world. But then came the Iran war.
“Some countries are in panic,” said the fund’s managing director, Kristalina Georgieva, addressing the finance ministers and central bank bosses in town for the IMF and World Bank spring meetings. “The sooner it [the Iran war] ends, the better for everybody.”
Such gatherings are not typically used to fight geopolitical battles. “You don’t get people shouting at one another at these things,” one senior figure remarked. But, as a record-breaking April heatwave swept the US capital, no one could ignore the mounting damage from the Iran war.
Those familiar with the mood over breakfast at a meeting of the G20’s representatives on Thursday, which included Donald Trump’s treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, and the outgoing US Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell – said the atmosphere in the room was sombre amid an open exchange of serious views.
“It is such a twilight-zone meeting,” said Mohamed El-Erian, a former IMF deputy managing director who is now chief economic adviser at the Allianz insurance group. “There are several shadows hanging over it: one is the shadow that comes from concern about the global economy as a whole.
“The second is that some countries are going to be particularly hard hit, and it’s mostly countries that very few people are talking about. But the third concern is the adding of insult to injury: the fact that the US, which started a war of choice, is going to be hit, but by a lot less than elsewhere in relative terms.”
Before Thursday’s breakfast, Rachel Reeves had started her day with an early-morning jog. Joined by her counterparts from Spain, Australia and New Zealand for a run down the iconic National Mall, she posted an Instagram selfie with a not-so-subtle dig: “Friends that run together – work together.”
A day earlier, the chancellor had told a CNBC conference that she thought “friends are allowed to disagree on things” as she criticised Trump’s Iran war as a “mistake” and a “folly” that had not made the world safer.
Speaking at a venue just steps away from the White House, before a one-on-one meeting with Bessent, she said this “fair message” was needed because UK families and businesses were feeling the pain from higher energy prices triggered by the conflict.
Those close to Reeves insist her meeting remained cordial. Britain and the US have significant shared interests in AI, financial services and trade. The chancellor also said the UK government had little time for the Iranian regime.
But with the IMF having warned on Tuesday that the Iran war could risk a global recession – in which Britain would be the biggest G7 casualty – it was clear Reeves had travelled to Washington ready to pick a fight.
“I’m struck by how vocal she has been and the words she used,” said one global financier. “We know the disagreement between Bessent and [European Central Bank president] Christine Lagarde earlier in the year. But that was in private.”
At a cocktail party held at the British ambassador’s residence for hundreds of diplomats and financiers – including the Bank of England’s governor, Andrew Bailey, the chief executive of Barclays, CS Venkatakrishnan, and dozens of senior figures – this transatlantic tension, weeks before King Charles’s US state visit, was a major topic of conversation.
The other, in the balmy residence gardens, was one of its former occupants, Peter Mandelson, as revelations about the former ambassador’s appointment threatened to further rock the UK government.
Before the war, the agenda for the IMF had been about global cooperation; the adoption of AI, jobs and work to eradicate poverty. Each of those tasks had now been complicated, but not least the task of countries working together.
For many at the meetings, the focus was on forging closer global cooperation without the world’s pre-eminent superpower.
“Everybody is talking about how you hedge against American decisions,” said David Miliband, the former UK foreign secretary, who now runs the International Rescue Committee. “You can’t do without them, because they’re 25% of the global economy. But, in a lot of fora, they’ve pulled out.
“So everyone has to think, how does one structure international cooperation? The old west is not coming back. And so everyone has to figure out how to position themselves for that world.”
For those gathering in Washington, there was irony in the fact that they were meeting in the halls of institutions founded, under US leadership, to promote global cooperation after the second world war. The whole idea of the Bretton Woods institutions was to avoid the dire economic conditions and warfare of the 1930s and 1940s. Yet this year’s meeting was taking place amid these intertwining problems.
In their conversations about the best economic policy response to the shock of conflict, the economists also knew the real power to make a difference lay two blocks across town from the IMF and the World Bank – behind the security cordons and construction equipment blocking the White House from public view. “It is not clear they can do anything about it,” said El-Erian.
Still, with a booming economy driven by AI – including Anthropic’s powerful Mythos model, the topic of much conversation – most countries cannot afford to completely break off US ties.
“People want to find ways to insulate themselves from the mess. But, on the other hand, they admire the US private sector,” El-Erian said. “The best way I’ve heard it put, is: they want to go long the private sector and short the mess. But it’s almost impossible to do.”
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