Vanilla, a 28-year-old chimpanzee, had never been outside of a cage or enclosure. She is one of the surviving chimps from the New York-based Laboratory for Experimental Medicine & Surgery in Primates (LEMSIP). Vanilla and her sister, Shake, have a new island home at Save the Chimps in Fort Pierce, Florida.
[Video report, 44 seconds]
Zoo enclosures are still really small for a sentient creature, though. Nobody would confine a 5 year old human to a space that small and call it humane.
I realize chimps and gorillas are extremely threatened in their natural habitats by humans (deforestation, poaching, etc) but I do suspect it would be better to focus resources on protecting them there instead of on keeping some in zoos.
Not that these are mutually exclusive. Obviously there are cases like this too with ex-lab or ex-exotic pet animals or injured animals that couldn’t survive in the wild - I can’t fault anyone for keeping them in zoos, when there is no alternative.