Wild elephant dashes seventy-year-old to death

“The moment the Elephant started attacking me with its trunk, my father shouted calling me, then the Elephant turned around to the side from where my father shouted and seeing him, he caught my father with its trunk and dashed him on the ground, instantly killing him,” said A.M. Sumith Amerakoon (33) at the inquest held into the death of his seventy-year-old father A. M. Karunarathne.

The victim had left home early in the morning to chase away an Elephant who had been roaming along the road in Mulgama, Balangoda, on November 2, so that his granddaughter proceeded to her school avoiding any danger.

This transpired at the inquest held by the Balangoda city coroner H.D. Ruban Peiris at the Balngoda Base Hospital.

Amerakoon giving evidence further said Elephants frequented Mulgama village in Balangoda, and it was too dangerous to use the roads to go about in attending to their needs. On the day of the incident, his wife and ten-year-old daughter had left home to the village school at around 06.15 a.m. The children were usually accompanied by elders due to the presence of wild Elephants in the area.

“They had to walk about one kilometre to reach the school, quite suddenly they returned screaming that there was an Elephant on the road. My father who heard this took with him some explosives used to drive away Elephants and hurried towards the place where the Elephant was spotted. I caught up behind him. The Elephant who had been inside a shrub unseen by us, suddenly dealt a blow at me with its trunk and I was thrown away to a distance. At that very moment, the Elephant struck me, my father shouted “Son.” The Elephant who seemed to have overheard my father’s call of alertness, ran towards the place from where his voice was heard and caught up my father with its trunk and dashed him on the ground. I was helpless and ran shouting for help.”

Along with some villagers the boy had then visited the site and found his father already dead with severe injuries.