Panda fans flock to Zoo Atlanta for the debut of Ping Ping and Fu Shuang

ATLANTA (AP) — Zoo Atlanta’s newest pandas munched bamboo and lounged Friday during their public debut as smiling visitors lined up to welcome them.

Ping Ping, a male, and Fu Shuang, a female, arrived in September from China under a 10-year loan agreement, bringing the cuddly black-and-white bears back to the zoo after a two-year absence. After spending the past weeks getting acclimated to their habitat, the 6-year-old pandas greeted visitors in the newly renovated Arthur M. Blank Panda Grove.

Eight-year-old Rachel Sutherland and her family were visiting from Sacramento, California, and extended their vacation by a day to see the pandas.

“They’re amazing,” said Rachel. She said she was partial to Ping Ping because the name reminds her of the color pink.

Ping Ping has distinctive dark circles around his eyes, while Fu Shuang has a protruding forehead, according to Xinhua News Agency. Both were born at Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in China.

The Atlanta zoo's panda enclosure had been empty since 2024, after four other pandas returned from the United States to China , ending a 25-year partnership amid strained relations between the two countries.

During a news conference Friday morning, Xie Feng, the Chinese ambassador to the U.S., said the pandas' arrival “marks the renewal of a decade-long bond between China and Zoo Atlanta.”

“We trust that under the loving care of Zoo Atlanta, the two pandas will eat happily, sleep soundly and grow healthy and strong in their new home, bringing twice the joy and happiness to everyone who loves them,” the ambassador said.

Georgia Tech student Kevin Wei, 18, said he'd been counting down until “panda day,” and felt especially connected to the animals because they are from his hometown of Chengdu.

“It's kind of like having a familiar bond,” Wei said. “Although I'm living in the U.S., I still can connect with myself and to China.”

China has long used pandas as part of its diplomacy globally, deploying the bears in loan programs as expressions of goodwill and letting loan agreements lapse when tensions arise .

Zoo Atlanta is one of three U.S. zoos that now house the popular bears.

The National Zoo in Washington returned three pandas to China in 2023 before accepting new arrivals Bao Li and Qing Bao in October 2024. The San Diego Zoo debuted two pandas in August 2024.

A decade ago, the International Union for Conservation of Nature reclassified giant pandas from endangered to vulnerable, reflecting pandas' growing numbers in the wild in China.

Resident Kim Herres, 76, said she has been visiting Zoo Atlanta ever since the city first received pandas in 1999. She said she sees pandas as a symbol of the world “doing the right thing” to protect animals.

“I'm just glad we've gotten them back,” she said. “Hopefully we won't make the Chinese mad, and they won't come get them.”