Wild Indian elephant breaks a tusk during lengthy rescue effort

  • 5 years ago
Forest officials in south India tranquillised and captured a wild elephant that was allegedly causing crop damage, breaking its tusk when it was being loaded for transport.

The rescued elephant, dubbed Chinnathambi, was recovered from around the Thadagam and Pannimadai regions in Coimbatore district in Tamil Nadu state today (January 25).

The forest officials attempted to dart the rogue elephant around 6:00am and missed, only darting it successfully around 6.15am.

Nevertheless, as the tranquillised Chinnathambi was with a female elephant and a calf, forest officials struggled for about two hours to separate them by chasing away the mother and calf elephant, meaning Chinnathambi had to be tranquilised again.

Once Chinnathambi was separated, forest officials then brought him under their control with the help of tame elephants Kaleem and Vijay. They then fitted him with a radio tracking collar.

After struggling for four hours total, the combined efforts of officials and tame elephants loaded Chinnathambi into a lorry and now

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