Footage of a preoccupied couple at a Billings bar, seemingly unconcerned about an armed robbery occurring around them, has gone viral this week.
The surveillance footage from the Tap Inn shows the robbery, in which a masked woman and two men enter the bar with guns and demand cash. The entire incident lasted less than a minute early Monday and was one of three Billings robberies in 24 hours.
Bobbi and Chuck Rhodes, the owners of the Tap Inn, said they've been fielding calls from across the country. The requests are usually for the video, but Bobbi said that this misses the point.
Those at the bar faced gun-toting robbers, who came through the door with weapons raised. Police have not identified suspects.
"Nobody has bothered to ask, 'How is my bartender doing? How are my patrons doing?'" Bobbi Rhodes said.
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The bartender is doing well and has worked since the robbery, Bobbi Rhodes said.
The patrons who garnered the most attention sat in the foreground of the footage. The pair smooched and smiled, nose-to-nose, as the robbers moved around them. The video was picked up across the United States as well as abroad — media in New Zealand, Australia and England ran the video with short blurbs.
The video posted to the Gazette's Youtube page has been viewed more than 18,000 times.
The robbers left with an undisclosed amount of cash; they even pilfered the small bills sitting atop the bar as tips. The Rhodeses hope that Billings police come back with answers.
"To me, they weren't professional at all," Chuck Rhodes said of the robbers. "They were just grabbing."
The Rhodeses have owned the Tap Inn for a year and a half and haven't had any similar incidents there before.
And aside from their bar being the subject of a brief viral tidbit, they said that it's now back to business as usual.
A couple of lovebirds in Montana were so focussed on each other they failed to notice an armed robbery. @rnbreakfast https://t.co/JNSVcATNHk
— Matthew Bevan (@MatthewBevan) April 13, 2016
Montana making NY headlines: Kissing couple oblivious to armed robbery at Montana bar https://t.co/o3IulMaI1a
— Bet G. (@_Bet_G) April 13, 2016
WATCH: Couple busy kissing at a bar misses robbers enter bar, rob it and then leave, before finally looking up. https://t.co/yifm5tQgmg
— Good Morning America (@GMA) April 13, 2016
Love is blind 😂😠https://t.co/Rs5VKpSxCE
— Julia Kehoe (@jkehoee) April 13, 2016