San Antonio Zoo unveils bat sculpture

SAN ANTONIO – The world’s fastest bat has a new tribute at the San Antonio Zoo.

The display, a five-foot tall bat light sculpture, was unveiled Wednesday.

Local artists Maureen “Momo” Brown and Charles “Pompa” Harrison designed the sculpture. The goal of the project is to raise awareness for Mexican free-tailed bats that live in the Bracken Cave outside San Antonio.

"Bats do a tremendous service for us in terms of eating insects,” Andy Gluesenkamp said. “The colony of bats in Bracken bat cave just up the road for example they eat about 400,000 pounds of insects a night. So that’s a tremendous benefit to humans."

Zoo officials hope the permanent display will help educate visitors about bats. The zoo also said they are hoping to create a wild bat habitat in the future.