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Whatever happens, DO NOT RUN. Whoever said that never had a 5,000kg animal coming for them at more than 40km an hour.
We were shooting a story on poaching in Kenya for the BBC. We had spent the previous day looking for and filming elephants that had been brutally killed for their precious ivory. We had great pictures up to then, but we also needed live elephants. And that's when the trouble began.
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what the camera saw
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We found a herd that was perfect, a group of adults with some young. But they were off the beaten track so, for the sake of better images, we left the safety of the jeeps and followed them on foot. With us were armed men of the Kenyan Wildlife Society anti-poaching unit. So we felt pretty safe. We followed and got some great shots, until a couple of hours later when things turned around.
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The remains of poached elephants were a grim sight
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Everything happened so fast. Before I knew it I was lying in the tall grass with a smashed viewfinder and pain in my ribs.
I was filming close-ups of the faces of the anti-poaching unit when I heard a loud unfamiliar scream and I turned around to see this 5,000kg animal running towards me, ears extended outwards, and my God, I could feel the earth vibrate. Right in front of me were two men of the unit and I was amazed at how quickly they disappeared, running away firing their weapons back towards the direction of the elephant and myself.
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Filming the remains of poached elephants
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Behind me armed men firing their weapons, in front of me a very pissed off elephant. Well, I run and run as if my life depended on it which it did! But instead of running back I run sideways and the elephant, too large and too fast, could not make the turn to follow me. However, I did not see the broken tree branch in my way. And I hit it, hard and fast, the camera fell in front of me and I fell on top of it, smashing the viewfinder and bruising my ribs. I stayed there for few seconds only to hear the growl of the elephant near by. I got up, and run towards safety.
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"We got very close to the elephants"
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We were not surprised that the elephant did not get me, but that I had not been shot by accident. The truth of the matter was that this armed unit had no experience of elephants; their job was to hunt poachers, so we could not blame them for panicking and trying to shoot us!
By David Hands
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