Free Republic

BUTTE, Mont. — Montana is known for plenty of large wildlife, like bears, mountain goats and elk. But elephants are a new one. Butte resident Mataya Smith was driving south on Harrison Avenue with her husband, who alerted her to the strange scene at noon on Tuesday. “I though he just meant it was in the parking lot. And then I looked up and was like, ‘No, there is an elephant in the road!’” said Smith. “My coworker pointed out, ‘There’s an elephant!’ Started jumping up and down, pointing out the window,” Civic Center Town Pump co-manager Josh Hannifin said....

Shocking video captured the moment a 5-ton bull elephant in Zambia charged at a safari vehicle — flipping it over several times and killing an 80-year-old American woman during an expedition. The unidentified woman was among six tourists with the group Wilderness Zambia who were out on a photography tour Saturday when they came under attack by the crazed beast, the Telegraph reported. “At around 9:30 a.m. on Saturday morning the six guests were on the game drive when the vehicle was unexpectedly charged by the bull elephant,” Wilderness Zambia CEO Keith Vincent said in a statement

The accident and pachyderm reprisal occurred Sunday night in Gerik, a region about 300 kilometres north of Kuala Lumpur... Police said the car was “negotiating a left bend on the highway” in drizzle and fog when it hit the baby elephant. “The car slammed into the young elephant that was walking on the road with the herd,” said Zulkifli Mahmood, Chief Superintendent at Gerik District Police. The calf then fell to the ground, he added. “Seeing this, the other (five) elephants rushed towards the car and started trampling it.” No (human) injuries were reported in the incident, but police photos...

An illustration of early humans hunting an elephant using spears. (courtesy Tel Aviv University) When elephants started disappearing from the Middle East some 400,000 years ago, it was a major crisis, and not just for the ancient elephants. Early humans across the region, including in what is now Israel, depended on elephants for their diet. Eventually, humans adapted, learning how to hunt smaller prey such as bison, deer and gazelles, until those, too, disappeared from the landscape or their numbers were too small to hunt. This forced humans to adapt to even smaller prey such as rabbits and birds, and,...

A “killer” elephant has reportedly claimed its eleventh victim, an auto-rickshaw driver, after rampaging through Indian villages. The elephant has reportedly killed 11 people and destroyed 300 houses and shops across the southern Indian states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu in recent years. Arikomban, translated to “rice tusker”, was named by locals can after his fondness raiding rice shops. He has been caught several times and relocated to nature reserves but activists have fought to free him.

Baby elephant disrupting a TV reporter.I hate it when this happens.

An elephant trampled a woman to death in India, only to return during her funeral to pull her body off a pyre and trample over her corpse again. The incident was said to have occurred in the eastern Indian state of Odisha on Thursday, and comes amid rising animal-human conflict in the country. Maya Murmu, 70, was targeted by a wild elephant that had strayed from a nearby wildlife sanctuary while collecting water in the district of Mayurbhanj. Despite being rushed to hospital, the elderly woman succumbed to her injuries in hospital and her body was placed on a funeral...

Gov. Tom Wolf is calling on policymakers to “be open to the things that work” to address gun violence “but we cannot ignore the elephant in the room and that is guns.” During an interview on Pittsburgh-based KDKA radio on Tuesday morning, Wolf reacted to last week’s mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, and a weekend shooting that killed an 18-month-old Pittsburgh boy saying a combination of measures are what he sees as needed.

Researchers at Cambridge University have developed a video game which teaches people how to spread misinformation about Covid-19. The aim of Go Viral! is to make it easier for players to spot fake news in the future.

ZIMPARKS spokesperson Tinashe Farawo said Michael Bernard Walsh (71) was killed while taking an unguided tour with his son in Mana Pools National park in the north of the country. The two had walked about 40 meters from where they had parked their car when they encountered the elephants, with one of them charging at them, Farawo said. The son managed to escape and reach the car while Walsh could not outrun the elephant which trampled him to death.

Ratchadawan Puengprasopporn said her family was asleep when she heard noises coming from the kitchen. When she and her husband went to investigate, they saw the elephant poking its head into her kitchen, rummaging through the shelves and eating a plastic bag containing food. This isn’t the first intrusion she’s had from Boonmee, a wild male elephant in his forties known among residents and park officials as a frequent visitor to the village. Local authorities and national parks officials visited Ratchadawan and her family the next day and advised her to remove food, especially anything salty. Pattarapol Maneeon, a veterinarian...

A groom in Prayagraj city of India’s Uttar Pradesh made a dramatic entry at his wedding venue in a horse-drawn chariot. To add some extra zing to his entry, the groom also booked a decked-up elephant to be part of his entourage.Footage from the wedding has gone viral, capturing the moments when the elephant lost its calm and charged at the people around it. The animal can be seen going on a rampage, damaging decorations and vehicles in the parking lot of the lit venue.VIDEOPeople can be seen running around seeking cover, while the groom jumps out of his chariot...

A Milwaukee man tried to break into the elephant enclosure at a local zoo to “impress his daughter,” authorities said. Armond Bullocks allegedly climbed over a locked fenced area in the outdoor exhibit at the Milwaukee County Zoo, around closing time on Wednesday, local outlets reported. He then began to scale a second fence — but was stopped by park workers before reaching the zoo’s two African elephants, officials said.

Wildlife rescuers responded to a reservoir in India where an elephant became stranded in the water with its legs tangled in a fishing net. The Forest Department said rescue crews responded to the Nugu reservoir, near Bandipur, when an elephant was seen standing in place in the water for more than three hours, sparking suspicions that the animal's legs were tangled in an illegal fishing net. The crews confirmed the elephant was caught in a net, but they couldn't get close enough to help because the animal would splash at boats that approached. The elephant finally allowed the rescue boats...

COVID-19, the Elephant, and the House Cat The really scary thing about this latest health scare is not the disease but the unexpected depths of passivity it revealed. • | , Here’s something special: a headline in The Economist that speaks the truth: “In Europe, and around the world, governments are getting tougher.” You betcha. Last week, I wrote with contempt about San Francisco’s mayor who had just announced she would “legally prohibit residents from leaving their homes except to meet basic needs.” “Well,” I thought, “It’s California, what do you expect?”But now several other states, including New York, Connecticut,...

I'M FURIOUS! I am watching this sham impeachment trial in its question-and-answer phase and am SHOCKED that Trump's defense team is overlooking the ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM.. The DemonRat House Managers' position is that an upcoming election should NOT prevent Trump from being impeached, yet by their OWN standard have the AUDACITY to state that Trump and his defense team MUST NOT DARE INVESTIGATE Joe Biden as this would be 'interference in an upcoming election'!

An elephant in a Zambian national park was caught in camera climbing over a wall to steal some mangoes from a safari lodge. The Bushcamp Company posted video to YouTube showing the big bull elephant climbing over a 5-foot wall outside the Mfuwe Lodge in South Lungwa National Park. Workers said the elephant stole some mangoes from the lodge before climbing back out over the wall. Lodge manager Ian Salisbury said lodge guests were amused by the elephant's maneuver. "He just chose the most direct route and made himself right at home. The guests were very amused at the idea...

ADORABLE: A zoo in Austria introduced a baby female elephant Thursday. She was born five days ago and weighed about 198 pounds at birth. She doesn’t have a name yet, but the public can vote on what it should be. Watch as she stumbles after her mom in the zoo’s enclosure.

Accomplice poachers told the victim's family that he had been killed by an elephant on Tuesday. ...A search party struggled to find the body but eventually found a human skull and a pair of trousers on Thursday. "Entering Kruger National Park illegally and on foot is not wise,"

Vatican Cardinal rebukes dubia authors for wanting abuse summit to address homosexuality ROME, February 25, 2019 (LifeSiteNews) – Cardinal Giuseppe Versaldi, who heads the Vatican’s Congregation for Catholic Education, dismissed as “useless” an open letter to the Vatican Abuse Summit participants from Cardinals Walter Brandmüller and Raymond Burke that warned against the "plague of the homosexual agenda" and homosexual networks in the Catholic Church. Cardinal Versaldi was among the churchmen attending the Feb. 21-24 Vatican summit on the sexual abuse crisis rocking the Church, which brought together 190 prelates and heads of congregations ostensibly to address the crisis and...