Two pandas leave China for a zoo in America

Two giant pandas have left China to live in the United States. Their names are Ping Ping and Fu Shuang. Early in the morning on September 27, 2026, at 2:55, they left Chengdu Shuangliu Airport on a charter plane^*1. Chengdu is a city in China. The pandas are going to Zoo Atlanta in Atlanta, a city in the United States. They will live there for ten years. The news came from China's National Forestry and Grassland Administration. This is the government office in China that looks after forests and wild animals.

Ping Ping is a male panda. He was born on March 17, 2020. He has big, dark patches around his eyes. Fu Shuang is a female panda. She was born on October 18, 2020. She has a tuft^*2 of hair on top of her head.

Before the pandas left, there was a goodbye event at the Chengdu Research^*3 Base of Giant Panda Breeding. This is a center in Chengdu where pandas are raised.

The Chinese team got the pandas ready for the long trip. Before the flight, the pandas had training so they could get used to travel. For the trip, the team packed fresh bamboo shoots^*4, bamboo, apples, and medicine for emergencies. Inside the plane, the air was kept at a temperature and dampness^*5 that pandas like. An experienced American animal doctor and an experienced American keeper^*6 flew with them.

Zoo Atlanta has also been getting ready. Since December 2025, Chinese experts and the zoo have talked about how to fix up the panda house. In the middle of September, the Chinese experts checked the finished panda house in Atlanta and approved it.

China and the United States have worked together to protect pandas for more than 20 years. Together they have done more than 30 research projects and written more than 50 scientific papers^*7. Pandas in this program have had babies five times, and seven baby pandas were born.

After Ping Ping and Fu Shuang arrive, they will first spend some time in quarantine^*8. Chinese staff will stay in Atlanta to help care for them.

1. *1 charter plane: a plane that is rented for one special trip
2. *2 tuft: a small bunch of hair that sticks up
3. *3 research: careful study to learn new things
4. *4 bamboo shoots: young bamboo plants; pandas eat them
5. *5 dampness: how much water is in the air
6. *6 keeper: a person whose job is to look after animals in a zoo
7. *7 scientific papers: written reports by scientists about what they learned
8. *8 quarantine: a time when an animal is kept apart from other animals to check that it is healthy