Bill_H

A friend who just returned from 6 weeks at Kruger sent me this link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/news...hant-kind.html

Bill

hguy47

That would have been a little more excitement than I would want. Looks like the elephant was excited, too.

bearable

Man, that's scary stuff. No tented safaris for me, that's for sure

P_M

Is that a really huge elephant or a very tiny car??

P_M

"Looks like the elephant was excited, too."

I see what looks like a 5th leg now. Gee, thanks for pointing that out.

doohickey

Holy Moly!!!

sandi

... and it only took a little car to turn him on! guys and their cars, all the same

sundowner

Someone sent this photo to me without the story. (Don't really need a story with this pic!) Anyway, I forwarded the email to my dad and he answered back asking me if it was real or photoshopped. Yeah, Dad, this is probably very real. Ellies are really that big. And aggressive. And scary.

tuckeg

Long, long, long time ago my father made the mistake of blowing his horn at an elephant standing in front of his car in India. Elie sat down on hood and totaled car. No injuries.

In Sabi Sands two years ago, while on a morning game drive we were chased by large bull in musth who suddenly appeared from behind some trees. Ranger said this was a particularly bad customer and if he had seen him, he would not have driven into the area. We were on a self-drive and at noon we left the lodge in our Tazz (tiny) and suddenly realized we were in the same spot where we had been chased. I could see history repeating itself, this time with injuries, but we were fortunate and he had moved on.

Kavey

This was printed in a paper I was reading a couple days back and I cut it out to keep.

Why?

Because it happened in Hluhluwe Umfolozi and we had exactly the same experience when we were there in 2004. Except we were alone in our vehicle, no others anywhere nearby so no-one could take a photo of it as it happened to us!

Looking at the size of the elephant and also at the track itself there's an extremely good chance it is the same elephant and in a similar location - the elephant is clearly a huge male as is the one that stopped and trunk touched the top of our car - our car was much taller being a 4x4 and yet he towered over us - oh and most roads were covered in tarmac but this happened to us on a narrower dirt road that we took off the main loop.

How exciting! What a trip down memory lane!

Gritty

Not to be too critical, but maybe this couple could have reversed when they saw that they were so close to the elephants? I think I would have tried to back up (slooowly), but then again I wasn't there when it happened. Elephants make me nervous.

Kavey

Well, let me tell you why we couldn't when we were in same situation.

We drove onto that road and saw some eles a fair distance from the road and turned the engine off to watch. After a while they started to come closer to the road so we drove 50 yards farther up the road to give them some space and then stopped the car and watched them out of the back window.

After another while the huge bull ele emerged from the bushes and started walking slowly up the road towards us. We turned back forwards planning to drive on down the road only to find that whilst we'd been facing backwards a different group of eles had emerged onto the road about 100 yards ahead of us.

With eles infront and behind we decided instead to pull the car as far to side of track as possible, turn off the engine and then just be quiet and wait.

The bull came right up to us, stood by us, actually lowered his head to peer in the window at us, lifted his head back up, touched the roof of the car with his trunk and then finally, after what seemed an age, moved on infront of the car and walked slowly onwards catching up with the group that had emerged in front of us.

Eventually they continued on far enough that they took one fork in the road and we then started the car and took the other fork and continued our journey.

tuckeg

Can't remember where it was (South Africa?) but in 2006 a park service pick-up was attacked by an elephant and a woman was killed and several other employees were injured. When we were stopped at night at the Zimbabwe/Zambia border that year the bus next to our was attacked and several windows smashed out. The danger is slight but real.

Feistybrit

Wow. I have only ever seen elephants in zoos (hope to change that when I go on my first ever safari in October) and I had no idea they were so huge. Seriously..the one's I saw where large but that one is e.n.o.r.m.o.u.s.....!
What an experience to have one that close! I think I would have fainted. ; )

kareng

Is there a time of year when bulls are in musth in Southern Africa or could bulls in musth be encountered any time?

Old_Elephant

Elephants in the zoos more often are the Asian elephants that are smaller in size and behave better in captivity.

Gritty

Thanks Kavey--great story, because you had a great sighting and everything turned out OK. Of course, I'm sure that at the time it happened you weren't thinking about how cool this story would be later on!

It's amazing how they can just appear out of the bush suddenly. My wife and I were driving in Kruger, on a sand road that parallels the Sabie River between Skukuza and Lower Sabie. I happened to look in the rearview mirror to see a bull (presumably in musth) standing in the road 75-100 meters behind me. He did not look happy AT ALL--ears out, head high, throwing his head around, etc. We both completely missed seeing him as we passed him!

Kavey

No, we were hardly daring to breathe for a few moments there.

And the thing is we had been taking a lot of care to keep our distance because on entering the park they had temporary notices up to keep distance from their eles as they were more aggressive than at other parks.

It was only after the trip that we found out that there had been an attack by an elephant on a ranger, I think it was, only a few months earlier. My memory is fuzzy but I think the ranger died... not sure.

So we'd really respected the distance request (we are very careful to respect the park rules and requests) as best we could.

But these eles took us by surprise.

cybor

Oh my dog, that bull is a big boy next to that toy of a car. Those poor occupants - their terrified faces say it all.

Makes one wonder if you should take out the extra liability package.

Thanks for sharing Bill.

eyelaser

I wonder if Amex covers that under the collision damage waver and I expect there was quite a mess in the front seat.
It's definitely not Lion Country Safari and stuff likes this happens, but fortunately infrequently.
Many years ago around Cape Point my S. African relative ignored the "keep windows rolled up" warning and had baboons displace him from his car. What a sight it must have been to see them in the driver's seat and him on the side of the road.
Regards,
Eric