The National Zoo’s director looking at Mei Xiang over the Panda Cam. Photo by the National Zoo.

The National Zoo’s Panda Cam has been around for 18 years, offering anyone with an Internet connection a chance to watch pandas as they go about their business. And while the cameras get about 1 million view per year, the news of a panda cub—and now we’ve had two, seven years apart—produces significant traffic spikes.

According to zoo officials, traffic to the Panda Cam jumped on Monday to 237,709 visitors, up from the 34,674 that visited on Saturday and 36,225 that stopped by on Sunday. The traffic brings with it the usual hangups—users might not be able to access the stream, for one.

But zoo officials have said that since Tai Shan’s birth in 2005, the zoo has moved to a dedicated server that is better equipped to handle the traffic. (It used to be hosted on a general Smithsonian server.) Still, the zoo’s website crashed yesterday.

Additionally, a $400,000 gift from the Ford Motor Corporation in early September will help upgrade the analog Panda Cam system, moving towards HD cameras. Zoo officials say the upgrades will also make the Panda Cam more compatible with Macs.

UPDATE, 2 p.m.: There’s video of the cub!