ESCAPING AN ELEPHANT'S WRATH

We left the old headman’s mangled body in the village and set off after the five elephant bulls that had killed him. I followed my Bushman trackers, Ben and Mbuyotsi, who carried my weapons – a FN .458 Magnum and a 9.3x62 Mauser. A local Batonka man carried the josak (water bag).

The elephants had left the village on the run, heading directly for the Chizarira escarpment that was visible on the hazy horizon. We crossed the dry Nabusenga River and moved onto an ancient elephant path that ran directly towards a gap in the distant mountain range. On the plateau, 700 metres above, lay the Chizarira National Park.

The elephants were moving abnormally fast, one behind the other. They urinated and defecated as they hurried along. They neither fed nor loitered. They were clearly disturbed and intent on putting distance between themselves and the man they had killed.

Their bowels were loose and their sloppy dung splashed thousands of undigested sorghum seeds across the path. At midday, the tracks led us down to a pool in the Ruziruhuru River gorge. Here they had bathed, cleansing their bodies of the bloody scent of man. Then they followed another path along the broken escarpment. Shortly thereafter they went to ground in a small, but heavy thicket up against the mountain.

The trackers stopped to listen. We all heard the thumps of elephant droppings hitting the ground. I drew my ash-bag, held it out in front of me and tweaked my wrist. A small cloud of wood ash drifted off on the air. The wind was constant.

The thicket was not extensive, but in full green leaf. On the left was a short cliff face where the heavy brush began. Two hundred metres further on was a jumble of big rocks where the thicket stopped and 150 metres behind the thicket rose the steep talus slope of the mountain escarpment.

My mouth and throat were dry, and not just from thirst. I had been absorbing the disturbed mood of the elephants all morning; and my mind was filled with visions of the mangled remains of the old headman. I needed a drink, but our intrepid josak carrier had disappeared. Damn his rotten hide!

There was certainly great danger in today’s hunt, but I had no cause for concern. I had plenty of experience with elephants and had never yet come across a situation I could not handle. But my mind was playing strange tricks. Today I was troubled. This worried me, because a hunter’s mental attitude has great bearing on his performance.

Mbuyotsi handed me my .458 and took the 9.3 from Ben. Ben was the better tracker, but Mbuyotsi was more competent with a rifle, although he had never had to use it. Altogether, we were an experienced and well-oiled team.

Parched and thirsty, with me in a dubious mental state, we entered that immensely dense thicket to take out the five Ruziruhuru killer bulls. And as my foot crunched the first of the dry leaves on the ground my consternation turned to fear. The trackers had found the elephants. It was now my job to kill them. I had done this many times before so why was I so inexplicably hesitant? Visions of the old man’s mutilated body kept floating into my mind! The bush was really thick. And despite some rain during the night, the dead leaves on the ground were brittle and noisy.

We could hear the soft flapping of elephants’ ears directly ahead of us. Every now and again one of them threw sand onto its back with its trunk. The sound was distinct; as was the occasional resonant growl. The elephants were dozing, but unusually fidgety. Although their disturbed movements were not normal they were still a comfort, because they told us the elephants were unaware of our presence.

silent aPProach

We approached our quarry slowly. Every step was calculated. We didn’t want to break even one of the myriad twigs in the heavy carpet of leaves beneath our feet. Slowly we insinuated our bodies through the heavy undergrowth beneath tall trees which formed a continuous canopy above our heads.

I repeatedly tested the wind. Inside the thicket the gentle breeze was whirling every which way. This was crazy. It was suicidal to approach any elephants – particularly these five bulls – under such conditions, but we had a job to do so I pushed ahead.

I felt the muzzle of Mbuyotsi’s rifle prodding my buttocks. I stopped and turned. He was frowning. His lips were puckered in a shushing gesture. The look on his face told me he was worried about my unnatural lack of concentration. He raised his eyebrows expressively and gestured with his face to my front. There, just 30 paces away, the swaying tips of four elephants’ trunks protruded above the understory canopy as they tested the wind.

Damn! They’d got our scent! I absorbed the silence. The elephants were standing dead still, clearly trying to pinpoint our location. They were listening, too. I could see them in my mind’s eye – immobile, ears flat against their shoulders. I made a mental effort to focus on the job in hand. If I didn’t I would get us all killed. I could see four trunks. Where was the fifth elephant? If they attacked we would not see them until their heads burst through the bushes directly in front of us. To kill five charging elephants under such circumstances would be a miracle.

The swirling currents of air were now working to our advantage. If it had been more constant the bulls may have charged us down on our scent trail alone. Just a nuance of sound, however, would give our position away and possibly that would trigger an attack. My nerves were strung to breaking point and I could feel the quivering of my damp hands as I held the rifle firm. Now was not the time to flip off the safety catch. Now was the time to wait out the evolving moment.

I had a tremendous urge to run, but running was not an option! Then my resolution firmed and I regained control of my nerves. This was a classical hunter/quarry stand-off. Whose nerves would break first? Hardly breathing, we stood for many long minutes – waiting, watching, listening. It is moments such as these that ‘maketh the hunter’… or they destroy him!

movement!

The elephants’ nerves broke first. It happened gently. There was the sound of branches rasping hollowly over an elephant’s stiff ear. A dead branch snapped under a heavy foot. They were on the move.

“Hamba,” Mbuyotsi urged. “Go… Go…”

I set off running towards the increasing sounds of big bodies jostling together through the thicket. The noise I was making was masked by the greater sounds made by the elephants themselves. Now was the time to get up behind the big bulls – close behind them. And when the first one turned to look back, it would get a bullet into its brain from behind the ear.

Suddenly they started running towards the high slopes of the escarpment talus. I had visions of me bursting through the back wall of the thicket to find the elephants struggling to scale the steep hillside. If that happened I would quickly drop all five of them like pins in a bowling alley.

I ran as fast as I could along the line of brush that the elephants had flattened in their stampede. The bulls emerged at the far side of the thicket and, instantly understanding their predicament they turned as one and charged back along the same route they had used in their outward flight.

I was running hard and fast, unaware that hunter and elephant were now on a collision course. Racing along, I was thinking only about what I would find when I broke out the back end of the bush. Then suddenly, I was confronted by the huge head of the lead bull racing pell-mell towards me. Taken completely by surprise I dug in my heels and came to a stop. My chest was heaving as I flicked off the safety. Dropping the foresight onto the animal’s brain I yanked the trigger. The bull dropped like a stone. Sliding along on its chest it came to a stop right at my feet.

Two more heads appeared. Swinging round their dead comrade they raced towards us. Frantically I worked the bolt. By then the second elephant had seen me and lowered its head – focusing all its attention on me.

Mbuyotsi’s 9.3 barked. The muzzle blast at my ear sent a blinding flash of pain deep into my skull. The elephant did not falter. My eyesight had been impaired by the muzzle blast and my vision was bombarded by bursts of bright lights. Fortunately through it all, I could still see the elephant.

I only had time to point the rifle at the elephant’s head and fire the heavy slug into its face. Then its trunk whacked into me, sending me flying backwards though the air. The back of my head and shoulders hit the ground with a heavy thump – knocking the wind out of my lungs. An excruciating pain stabbed at my brain through my right ear. My mind was in turmoil. I could not breathe.

under attack

I next found myself beneath the mass of a dark and angry leviathan. Its monstrous feet crashed into the ground mere inches from my face. Its hind legs kicked me forwards. I felt the cracking snap of breaking ribs. Terrified I tumbled about weakly, trying to avoid further injury. In the face of such gigantic strength man is helpless and my inability to breathe had me in a state of virtual paralysis.

Suddenly I was no longer staring at the under surface of the mammoth’s belly. My rifle was not in my hands and I felt naked and vulnerable without it. I was staring death in the face with no defence against it. Other elephants raced by while I sensed the immense rump of a big bull elephant towering over me.

Punch drunk, the giant bull’s front legs were spread-eagled, its body was shaking wildly as it struggled to keep on its feet. His ears bashed against his shoulders and he shook his head in angry confusion. ‘Now I am going to die,’ the thought flashed through my mind as I was subsiding into a subconscious state.

In the deep recesses of my mind I heard an elephant trumpeting, then screaming. There was a loud and shattering report. Then another!

i survived

In the leaden vitals of my foggy mind, I felt the impact of the elephant’s monstrous body crashing to the ground. Then I was being jostled violently and rhythmically by a strange and powerful force. All at once my first breath came and with a harsh, searing sob my whole body shuddered. An excruciating pain exploded deep in my chest as my crippled diaphragm relaxed. My lungs expanded. And with each new breath my state of sub consciousness receded.

I was still being violently shaken when my eyes refocused. I was lying with my head pressed up against the lower back leg of a recumbent elephant’s body. The rhythmic, shaking motion was the spasmodic jerking of the animal’s hind legs.

Then Mbuyotsi and Ben were at my side. They manoeuvred me out from under the elephant’s legs. Thank God for faithful trackers! Two of my ribs were broken. Two elephants were dead. The day’s hunt was over.

We had all survived! We had been lucky. I was sore, bruised, battered and broken – but I was alive! This was a hunt that I knew I would never forget.