'Frantic' kangaroo smashes into Aussie office

An Australian psychologist had to be rescued from her office after a "frantic" kangaroo crashed through the window and leapt around the room, toppling furniture, a colleague said Thursday.

Suzanne Habib jumped screaming atop her desk in the Queensland town of Atherton as the 1.5-metre (five-foot) marsupial burst through the window behind her with a "big bang", said colleague Tony Baddock.

"Poor old Suzanne just screamed and went straight up in the air," Baddock told the AAP newswire.

"The 'roo was bounding around all over the place, it really was quite frantic."

Baddock said he helped his distressed colleague from her office over a toppled bookshelf. After smashing around the room for about six minutes, the kangaroo hopped into the main part of the building.

"I was then able to block its pathway and encourage it to head out the front door," he said, adding that it almost bowled over a bystander as it bounded off.

He said it was puzzling to find a kangaroo in the town, which is some distance from its native bushland. Kangaroos are shy and retiring by nature, and rarely venture into human dwellings.

A startled chef, clad only in his underpants, made headlines this March after wrestling with a kangaroo which jumped through a window and onto his bed in Australia's capital Canberra.

Swiss immigrant Beat Ettlin said he thought it was a "lunatic ninja" when he heard the animal crashing into his home, and suffered scratches to his legs and buttocks while dragging it from the house in a headlock.