Iain Douglas-Hamilton’s Near Death Report
savetheelephants.com
It happened like this. Late one afternoon, he stopped by my tent and asked: Want to drive out and see some elephants before sunset? He often rewarded himself that way for eight hours' deskbound effort. On this occasion I said: How about a walk instead? I knew that foot travel within the reserve was generally inadvisable, but couldn't we at least climb the little conical hill just behind camp? Yes indeed, he said; and so we did. From the hill's rocky top we savored a magnificent view westward, with the brown slick of the Ewaso Ngiro winding its way downstream between banks bristling with palm and acacia. Just north of us was a larger hill, a double mound known as Sleeping Elephant. Have you ever climbed that one? I asked. No, said Douglas-Hamilton, with a mischievous glint in his eye … but we could.
Thus we set out on foot toward Sleeping Elephant: two middle-aged white men and a young Samburu from the camp crew, a skinny lad named Mwaniki, in his beads and his shuka, whom Douglas-Hamilton asked to tag along. We walked only five minutes through the high, sparse brush before we saw elephants ahead: a female with two calves. We paused, admiring them from a safe distance until they seemed to withdraw, and then we went on. Seconds later Mwaniki muttered a warning, and we looked up to see the female glowering at us from 70 yards away. Her ears were spread wide. She was agitated. Seventy yards might sound like a long distance, but in personal space for an elephant, it isn't. Trumpeting vehemently, she charged.
I turned and ran like a fool. Mwaniki turned and ran like a gazelle. Douglas-Hamilton turned and ran—then thought better of it, turned, threw his arms out, and hollered to stop her. Sometimes this works; some elephants (such as old Boadicea, back at Manyara) make bluff charges, or half-hearted ones, and can be halted by a gutsy challenge. But this charge wasn't bluff. The female honked again and kept coming. Douglas-Hamilton turned again and ran.
By this time I had a 20-step lead and Mwaniki was gone. At the rate he'd been moving, he might have been halfway to Lamu. But no: He ran straight back into camp (we learned afterward) and shouted in Samburu: "Etara lpayian ltome!" Meaning: The old man has been killed by an elephant! This announcement, though premature, brought people back to the scene fast.
Meanwhile the elephant caught Douglas-Hamilton as he tried to evade her by circling a bush. From 50 feet away I watched her lift him with her trunk and then toss him, as you'd toss dirt off a shovel. He uttered a single piteous word: "Help." She stepped forward and stabbed her tusks downward. Douglas-Hamilton's body was now obscured by tall grass, and I couldn't see whether she had nailed him. Then she backed off about ten steps and paused. This was the moment, he told me later, when he had time to wonder whether he would die.
She turned away. She marched off to find her calves.
I ran back to Douglas-Hamilton, and to my surprise, his innards weren't hanging out like ratatouille. He was scratched, dazed, bruised, rumpled; his shoes, glasses, and watch were gone; but he was OK. I felt all over his rib cage: no tusk holes. Between us, we got him to his feet. And then a dozen people arrived, running and driving from camp. Someone found his glasses and shoes. The watch was busted but ticking. Quickly we vacated the area, lest the elephant change her mind and come back.
In the aftermath Douglas-Hamilton and I pieced together what had happened. There was much relief, much apologizing (especially by me, for getting us out there on foot, but he wouldn't hear of that and claimed the blame himself), and much hypothesizing. With help from Daballen and Lentipo, he established that this female must have been Diana, of the Royals, with her two youngish calves. Maybe we startled her because the wind had been at her back; therefore she couldn't smell us before we got near. Maybe she feared for her calves. Maybe she had been put on edge by a pushy bull, or a lion, just before we blundered along. Is there anything in the records on Diana, he asked his people, that would suggest a recalcitrant disposition? There was not.
Diana. She was "just" another elephant: sensitive, volatile, and complex. Her behavior that afternoon, though violent, had been nuanced. At the last moment she made a choice. She chose not to kill him. And no one, not even Iain Douglas-Hamilton, with all his magical gadgetry and his hard-won knowledge, will ever know why.
