News

Bidvest Protea Coin, a security solutions provider to many South African organisations and government institutions, has a specialised team heading in to assist with the search for the lion which escaped from Karoo National Park near Beaufort West on 15 February.

Company Chief Operations Officer, Waal de Waal, says “Although this is not Bidvest’s core business, we are keen to assist due to the unique circumstances of the case, our love for animals and conservation and because our specialised equipment is perfectly suited to the requirements and conditions. We have one of only two choppers in the country fitted with forward-looking infrared (FLIR), or thermal imaging infrared cameras, which allows us to pick up heat signatures on the ground over a radius of 10 kilometres when flying at night”.

The four-person team left Centurion in Gauteng this morning and after a couple of stops to refuel along the way, de Waal and his team are expected to arrive in Fraserburg at about lunchtime today. Here they will meet up with Karoo Park Manager, Nico van der Walt and his group of rangers and trackers on the ground and discuss their plan of action. The Bidvest team also has a tracker on board, who will assist the team on the ground.

De Waal has availed his team to the Park for the next three days and nights. “We will be joined on Saturday by a drone pilot we use quite regularly, who is also equipped to fly at night. We hope the combination of FLIR and the drone will be able to assist in getting the rangers on the ground closer to the lion. We are happy to assist South African National Parks at no cost – with the hope that we can play a small role in seeing a happy outcome with the lion’s return to Karoo National Park,” says de Waal.

Van der Walt says the technology is welcome. “Should the aerial team be able to track the lion down overnight and keep an eye on him while the ground teams are resting, we will have a much better idea of where to continue our search, hopefully from much closer, in the morning,” he says. “This will give us an advantage over the lion which we haven’t had to-date.”

Meanwhile, the team picked up the lion’s spoor about 110km in a north-westerly direction from the Park this morning. They hoped that yesterday’s rain would assist in providing the trackers with fresh spoor to follow. The team consists of about a dozen rangers and trackers, thanks to the assistance of rangers sent in from Addo Elephant, Camdeboo and Mountain Zebra National Parks in the Eastern Cape.

Issued By

South African National Parks (SANParks) Corporate Communications

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Fayroush Ludick
SANParks Frontier Region Communications Manager
Tel: (012) 426 5371, Cell: 082 888 0201
Email: [email protected]

Reynold “Rey T” Thakhuli
SANParks GM: Media, PR & Stakeholder Relations
Tel: 012 426 5170, Cell: 073 373 4999
Email: [email protected]