Watch adorable koala drinking water from bucket at a primary school park

It was a bright, sunny day in Adelaide, South Australia, when a journalist suddenly encountered a koala at Mitcham Primary School reserve. The little one seemed thirsty and exhausted due to the hot weather.

The Advertiser journalist Craig Cook said that he unexpectedly found the animal on Wednesday, 7 February, afternoon. He said that the koala climbed down from the tree and started to follow him.

"I had never been so close to a koala and backed away but the koala kept following, eventually sitting at my feet. Given the extreme weather it seeded reasonable she would need a drink and when one was provided the koala drank for 20 minutes without stopping.

"Local residents gently poured water on its back and at no time did it seems scared or concerned by the attention," Cook said, who made a video of the cute incident that has gone viral.

The video shared by Cook on Twitter shows the innocent animal slowly sipping water and enjoying attention from the locals. "The wonderful experience last well over 30 minutes until nightfall," Cook said, adding even after koala returned to his bay, a bucket full of water and another dish of water were left near his tree.

The journalist went on saying that the wonderful encounter was a reminder that "all animals need assistance with hydration in such hot weather and my family will be checking the reserve every hot night from now on".

Koala is an arboreal herbivorous marsupial found in Australia. It is also a nocturnal, which means it is awake at night and asleep during the day. It looks like a bear and is easily recognisable by its stout, tailless body and large head with round, fluffy ears and large, spoon-shaped nose.

Now, there are likely to be less than 80,000 koalas left in Australia because of habitat loss.