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Even better - a photo shows how it can really happen!! Great plan!

The elephant or the dumb people in the car.

All I am saying, and this comes to a totally off topic point:

Firstly people are given the wrong impression about wild animals in the media. If you look at the pragrammes dave Salmoni has on NatGeo Wild, you know the one he says "BIIG LION....... BIG BIIIIG LION"

What the people dont see is the 300 backup vehicles with 30 guns on each vehicle to protect him if the Lion does decide to eat him. And now, also this video. The next guy is also just going to stand there, cause he saw this video, and get himself, and his family maybe killed, cause he saw this video, and thought: "Oh, just another stupid animal"

I would prefer it if it was made VERY clear, that this is a life threatening situation, not only for the people, but also what would happen to the animals that will eventually kill a person, or people.

I am not pointing fingers only at you, but all the people putting sensationalist videos on the net for hits. I think all people that does put such media out there has a responsibility toward fellow humans, as well as the animals out there, to ensure the best possible outcome between humans and nature, cause nature is always going to lose the fight.

Fully agreed about the sensational snippets on the net.
We can not control but at least try to add the comments.
Dumb sensational people creating a dangerous situation for tourists and animals.

This type of behavior - getting too close to elephants - is not restricted to inexperienced tourists by any means. Dream Weaver and I saw a tour driver (I wouldn't honour him with the title of guide) from a big lodge in Phalaborwa last month antagonising a bull elephant, which was trying to cross the road, by repeatedly driving straight at him and stopping just short, getting him to mock charge his vehicle merely to give his guests a cheap thrill.

This is the type of behaviour that gives tour operators a bad name. They are guests in the Park and are expected to act responsibly. They are privileged to use it for their commercial purposes. They should be setting a good example to the tourists they are showing around.

Taunting of animals is totally unacceptable.

We gave him a mouthful as he passed us, I can assure you! I hope it made him look small in front of his guests.

We had a similar situation a few years back and when we stopped next to him and SO gave him a blast, he laughed loudly...... that was until we told him we had it all on video and was going to report him, not only to his boss but also to Sanparks! (which we did)
Pretty much wiped the smile off his face instantly.

If they get 3 reports of bad behaviour they can get their license to work in the park revoked.

Oh OK Elsa, I don't have photographic evidence but have a record of when and where, so I suppose I should at least report the incident to the lodge so they can counsel their staff.

I am glad that Sanparks follows/applies consequence management best practices .

Yes I would do that Chacma asap, otherwise they get away with it and think they can do it again and again, until some innocent visitor suffers the wrath of the now aggressive ellie.

We have a friend who is in the guiding profession and she says Sanparks are very strict about that sort of thing from outside OSV companies.

Well it does not take Einstein to work out that taunting a bull elephant in that way can store up trouble for any other innocent visitors that happen to meet him.

For a long time I have believed that Kruger elephants can be aggressive because human visitors have been harassing them.

If we see on here a video of visitors throwing rocks at a sleeping lion, then there is no reason to doubt that they would do the same to a peaceful ellie if they wanted to see some action.

It does make a person despair really. It is such a very great privilege to see these animals in the wild and watch them. It is beyond belief that people would deliberately upset them and cause the ellies to feel threatened by us.

I dont understand something about this elephant vs car issue. In the first photos with the car on its wheels, it is cleary a white chevy spark. Once the car is on its roof and the pics showing the hole in the door, it has mysteriously changed into a white hyundai atos....... Can anyone explain that?

The Chevvy was the first victim, and the Atos, the second, so 2 cars attacked.

There were actually 2 different cars involved in the incident, same Ellie.
The Atos was the one that got pushed over.

Now where were we now ..... going around in circles again.

The first car drove a few hundred meters before the second one. It was only a minute or two between the two accidents.

During the past week I had the opportunity to visit a private game farm bordering the Limpopo river near Pontdrift. They had their first rain for the season during our visit and the area was bone dry with not even a blade of grass visible anywhere. Broken mopanies everywhere and temperatures reaching 42 degrees did not help either.

Many starving and thirsty animals visited the campsite during the evenings and water-cribs had to be repaired on a daily basis. Fences must also be maintained by the owners on a daily basis even though I saw a couple of army vehicles driving (and littering) regularly. Fences are no longer electrified and the ellies know that - they simply push it over and then walk for meters along and just flatten it. Between the original two electrified fences are three rolls of coiled barbed wire and inspection entrances every few kilometers (making no difference).

We drove through one of these "gates" and spent a few hours down at the river looking across into an even drier Botswana. Even though the Limpopo was still flowing, the ellies walk through the river and destroy the fence in search of food. Their is a farmer in the area that produce citrus (oranges), and I would guess that he spend lots of money to try to keep going. Fortunately the rain arrived during our stay - 44mm and again 34 mm two days later. Between Pontdrif and Alldays numerous fences are down because of ellies.

So what does this have to do with Kruger ellies? - Let's just say I'm glad we only found the fresh tracks every morning. We did not dare to go an a walk during the day and made sure we were back in camp way before sunset. When repairing broken pipes and/or ball-valves we were always on the lookout for the ellies. A tracker was recently seriously injured and lucky to be alive.

From personal experience I treat any ellie as if I'm 100% sure that they know people are hunters and that they act accordingly. If you think you know enough about ellie behavior, all I ask is that you have a serious re-think.............