Kozhikode:

Three elderly persons died amidst a stampede caused as a result of two elephants getting agitated following the bursting of crackers during a festival at the Manakulangara Temple near Koyilandy here on Thursday evening, police said.

The elephants were brought for the temple festival and they became agitated and ran towards a small building near the shrine, police said.

When the elephants hit the building, a portion of its wall collapsed, leading to some people getting trapped underneath it, police said.

It further said that according to information it has received so far, the collapse of the wall resulted in the death of the two women and a man.

“People also panicked which resulted in a stampede leading to around 20 persons suffering minor injuries,” an officer of Koyilandy police station said.

The incident occurred around 6 pm, he said.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan condoled the deaths and said it was a tragic incident.

Following the incident, state Forest Minister A K Saseendran sought an urgent report regarding the incident from the District Collector and the Chief Forest Conservator (Social Forestry) of the Northern Region.

The minister said that further action will be taken based on the report and that it will also be investigated whether there has been a violation of the Kerala Captive Elephants (Management and Maintenance) Rules, according to a government statement.

Meanwhile, state Health Minister Veena George directed that special arrangements be made at the Koyilandy Taluk Hospital and Kozhikode Medical College for treatment of those injured in the incident.

George also instructed that there should be enough expert doctors, nurses and other staff at the two hospitals for treatment of the injured, the statement said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

The incident is said to have taken place on Saturday.

A 22-year-old Spanish tourist died in Thailand after being attacked by an elephant while bathing the animal at an elephant care centre. Blanca Ojanguren Garcia, a resident of Valladolid in northwest Spain, was bathing an elephant at Koh Yao Elephant Care on Friday, January 3, when the animal pierced her with its tusk, Spanish outlets El Mundo and El Pais reported. She died later of her injuries. At the time, Ms Garcia was visiting the island of Yao Yai in southwestern Thailand with her boyfriend. Authorities have not yet released details on the extent of her injuries or whether her boyfriend was also harmed.

Ms Garcia was a fifth-year student at the University of Navarra in Pamplona, Spain, pursuing a degree in Law and International Relations. As part of her studies, she was participating in a university exchange program in Taiwan. The university has issued a statement expressing its deep sorrow over her tragic death, offering condolences to her family and requesting prayers for her soul.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Spanish Embassy confirmed Blanca’s death and said it is assisting her relatives, who are thought to live in Valladolid. “We can confirm the tragic death in an accident of a Spanish tourist. The Spanish Consulate in Bangkok is in contact with the victim’s relatives and is offering all the necessary consular assistance, as is normal in these types of circumstances,” the statement said.

According to experts, the elephant’s attack may have been triggered by stress caused by living and interacting with tourists outside of its natural ecosystem, as reported by newspaper Clarin. In Thailand, washing and bathing with elephants are common tourist activities, which can potentially disrupt the animals’ natural behaviour and cause them undue stress.

Elephants in Thailand

Thailand is home to a significant population of elephants, with the Department of National Parks estimating that over 4,000 wild elephants reside in its sanctuaries, parks, and nature reserves. Additionally, there are around 4,000 domesticated elephants, primarily used in tourist shows.

However, the treatment of these domesticated elephants is a concern. The World Animal Protection Organization estimates that 2,798 elephants are held in tourism venues across Thailand, often kept in isolation and forced to perform unnatural tricks and activities. The organization has also reported that trainers frequently employ cruel, punishment-based training methods, including physical abuse with sticks or sharp metal objects.

Notably, Thailand has made significant efforts to protect its elephant population. The country has established protected areas, such as the Western Forest Complex, which provides a habitat for a significant number of wild elephants. Further, Thailand has implemented laws, including the Elephant Ivory Tusks Act and the Wildlife Conservation and Protection Act, to safeguard elephant welfare and prevent exploitation.

Human-elephant conflicts have been escalating in Thailand, particularly since 2000. According to data from the Thai department of national parks, there have been at least 227 deaths caused by wild elephant attacks in the past 12 years, including 39 fatalities in 2024.

A 63-year-old farmer died after he was attacked by a herd of elephants in Assam’s Boko district on Wednesday, officials said. The incident took place when the farmer, Warlington W Sangma, was guarding his paddy field from the elephants in Tangabari in Jongakhuli reserve forest.

According to the villagers, the wild elephants trampled and dragged Sangma around the paddy field for a few minutes, resulting in his death.

The victim was a resident of Rajapara, near Jongakhuli village, officials said.

The Boko Police and members of the Singra Forest Range have recovered the victim’s body and sent it for postmortem.

Following the incident, officials made announcements on loudspeakers around several areas, alerting the locals of the increasing attacks by elephants.

“We also urged the villagers to clear the paths which wild elephants use to commute, so that the conflicts will be decreased,” Singra Ranger Bhargab Hazarika said.

According to West Kamrup DFO Subodh Talukdar, the attacks by the tuskers are rising due to the encroachment in the reserve forest land.

“Villagers are now starting deforestation of the forest land and horticulture crops like banana, battle nuts, pineapples and also cultivating paddy in the paddy land under the forest reserve areas. Due to this, wild elephants suffer from food scarcity and enter the farmlands situated in the forest lands,” Mr Talukdar said.

He added, “Now the situation is more grim because people are demanding to enact the Forest Rights Act 2006. We have to survey the whole area so that we can find out the encroachments in the reserve forest area and take necessary action accordingly.”

On Tuesday, the bodies of two elephants were found in two different places under the West Kamrup Divisional Forest area in the Kamrup district. Villagers from Pakharapara and nearby areas under the Singra Range Office in Boko found the bodies in a paddy field, officials said.

As per the preliminary investigation, the elephants were suspected to be electrocuted – an illegal method used to chase wild elephants in order to protect their farms.

The state forest team also found some materials used for electrocution from the spot.

New Delhi:

In another incident of a selfie gone wrong, a wild elephant attacked and trampled a labourer to death in Maharashtra. Srikant Ramchandra Satre and his two friends visited the Abapur forest in Maharashtra’s Gadchiroli on Thursday morning to see a wild elephant. But little did they know the trio wouldn’t come back together. While two of the men had a narrow escape, Shrikant was attacked and killed by the wild elephant. The incident happened during a selfie session in the forest area.

Srikant Satre, 23, had come from Navegaon with some of his friends for cable laying work in Gadchiroli district.

Two days ago, on Tuesday, information about a wild elephant coming out of the Chittagong and Gadchiroli forest area was received. It was said that the elephant was roaming in the Abapur forest of the Mutnur forest area. At the same time, Shrikant, 23, and his two friends were in the area for work. In between they decided to go elephant viewing.

The trio was enjoying themselves in the forest when Srikant decided to take a selfie with the elephant from a distance. Soon the elephant attacked and crushed him.

The two friends managed to save their lives and escape while Srikant had an unfortunate fate.

Korba:

A 65-year-old woman from Chhattisgarh’s Korba district became the fifth victim of a savage attack by a wild elephant which had trampled four persons to death in separate incidents in the area over the last month, officials said on Saturday.

In the latest incident that occurred near Baghmara village in the Balco forest range, the pachyderm also trampled two bulls to death, a forest officer said.

The tusker elephant attacked Bhalai Bai and her husband in their hut in an agricultural field near the village on Friday night when they were asleep, said Arvind PM, Divisional Forest Officer, Korba forest division.

Bhalai Bai’s husband survived as he managed to run away from the spot. The elephant also attacked and killed two bulls in the area, he said.

After being alerted about the incident, forest and police personnel rushed to the spot and sent the body for a postmortem.

The family of the killed woman was given financial assistance of Rs 25,000 and the rest of Rs 5.75 lakh will be paid later as per the procedure, the forest officer added.

Notably, the same tusker had trampled an elderly man to death on September 4 in the Katghora forest division in Korba district, and three women at separate places in the Katghora forest division on August 8.

Forest and police personnel have been keeping a tab on the movement of the pachyderm and engaged in chasing it away from human settlements, officials said.

Human-elephant conflicts in Chhattisgarh, particularly in the northern part of the state, have been a major cause of concern over the last decade. The menace has been spreading its footprint in some districts of the Central region in the past few years.

Surguja, Raigarh, Korba, Surajpur, Mahasamund, Dhamtari, Gariaband, Balod, Balrampur and Kanker districts have witnessed the attack by elephants on humans.

According to the forest department, over 300 people were killed in elephant attacks in Chhattisgarh in the last five years.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

In a terrifying incident, a US tourist from New Mexico was killed by an elephant in Zambia after it attacked her vehicle during a safari drive on Wednesday. Officials reported that the elephant pulled Juliana Gle Tourneau, 64, out of the vehicle and trampled her, Metro reported. The incident occurred near the Maramba Cultural Bridge in Livingstone when the group had stopped due to traffic caused by an elephant herd.

She was taken to a clinic in Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park, where she was declared dead on arrival. According to a police statement, her injuries included deep wounds on the right shoulder blade and forehead, a fractured left ankle, and a slightly depressed chest.

Ms Tourneau died around 5.50 pm ”after being knocked from a parked vehicle which had stopped due to traffic caused by elephants around the Maramba Cultural Bridge”, Southern Province Police Commissioner Auxensio Daka told Zambian station ZNBC on Friday.

Officials did not say whether anyone else was injured or what led to the elephant’s aggression.

This tragic event marks the second fatal elephant attack on a US tourist in Zambia this year. In March, Gail Mattson, a 79-year-old woman from Minnesota, was killed in a similar incident during a game drive in Zambia’s Kafue National Park. An elephant charged and overturned the truck, resulting in her death and injuries to five others. 

In response to these incidents, Zambian authorities have urged tourists to exercise extreme caution while observing wildlife. Similar concerns have been raised in neighbouring countries like Zimbabwe and Botswana, which have also reported increasing elephant populations and deadly attacks in recent years.

According to experts, human deaths are rare in encounters with elephants. ”This is a freak accident. It’s probably just some sort of coming together of unfortunate circumstances that led to this,” Nikhil Advani, a senior director at the World Wildlife Fund, a nonprofit that works on environmental protection and conservation efforts told the New York Times. 

Hyderabad:

A 35-year-old farmer died after being attacked by a wild elephant in Kumaram Bheem Asifabad district of Telangana on Wednesday, the forest department said.

The incident occurred on the outskirts of Burepalli village in Chinthalamanepally mandal of the district when the victim was working in an agricultural field, they said.

“For the first time a wild elephant entered Telangana from Maharashtra… there are no wild elephants in Telangana. It seems a herd of 70-75 elephants is moving along the other side of Pranahita river in Maharashtra. One of the elephants–a male tusker, strayed into Telangana by crossing Pranahita,” a senior forest department official told news agency PTI.

“Our Maharashtra counterparts had informed us in advance about the movement (of elephants) and we have been monitoring. We had requested the villagers not to venture that side. In spite of our warning one person had gone to the field where he was attacked by the elephant and died,” the official said.

The forest officials have cordoned off the entire area to make sure that elephant does not enter the village, he said.

“… if the elephant does not go back by tonight, then tomorrow we will have to drive it away,” the official added.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Pathanamthitta:

A 53-year-old man was attacked and killed by a wild elephant when he tried to chase it away after it strayed into the surroundings of his house near the forest in Thulappally here on Monday, police said.

This is the fifth death reported in the conflict between humans and wild elephants in Kerala in the past three months.

Biju, a local auto driver, came out of his house with his wife Daisy after hearing the trumpets of an elephant outside. The animal grabbed him using its trunk and threw him to the ground twice, said Daisy, an eye witness.

The same elephant had strayed into the area and created trouble the other day, she claimed.

Recounting the incident, Daisy said that the animal was seen trying to uproot a coconut tree in the surrounding area and moved towards him quickly after trumpeting multiple times and added that she stepped back and moved inside her house.

“We went out together, hearing the sounds of the elephant near our home early in the morning. The first time, we came back home together. But he went to the road near the house again as the elephant was trumpeting,” Daisy told reporters here.

The teary-eyed woman said the animal rushed towards Biju suddenly and grabbed him by its trunk, throwing him to the ground twice.

It later ran away into the forest, she said.

“As there was no response, I went to the spot and saw him lying motionless on the floor,” Daisy added. A police team rushed to the spot and shifted Biju’s body to Kottayam Medical College.

Later in the day, Health Minister Veena George visited Biju’s house and consoled his family members. She assured them that the government would provide adequate compensation to the family as quickly as possible.

Local residents staged an intense protest in the area, demanding compensation for the victim’s family and a job for a family member as a permanent solution to address the loss they suffered due to the wild elephant attack.

In a discussion held between people’s representatives and district and forest officials, a compensation of Rs 10 lakh was decided to be handed over to the killed man’s family today itself.

Lok Sabha MP Anto Antony who participated in the meeting, later told reporters that as per the decision taken during the meeting, the district collector would recommend the government to grant Rs 50 lakh to the family as compensation.

“One of the family members of Biju will be given a temporary job at the forest office here immediately. The recommendation for a permanent job will be submitted to the government,” he said.

A decision was also taken to erect solar fencing and trenches in the fringe areas bordering the forest and a decision would be implemented at the earliest in this regard, the MP added.

Kerala has witnessed a series of deaths of people due to the attack of wild elephants in recent months.

A tribal woman was trampled to death by a wild elephant deep inside a forest area bordering Wayanad and Malappuram districts on March 28.

A forest watcher, 50-year-old Paul, was trampled to death by a wild elephant while he was on his way to work at Kuruva in Wayanad district on February 16.

A week before that, another Wayanad resident Aji (42), was trampled to death by a radio-collared elephant in Mananthavady in the district, triggering massive protests.

In January, an estate watcher, Lakshmanan (65) was killed by a wild tusker at Tholpetty, also in the same district.

In central Kerala’s Idukki district, which is also heavily forested and mountainous, a woman identified as Indira Ramakrishnan was killed in an elephant attack in the first week of March.

Prajeesh (36) was mauled by a tiger in December last year near a forest area in Vakeri in Wayanad.

The Kerala government has been seeking to amend the Wildlife (Protection) Act, citing challenges faced by the state in dealing with instances of wild animals encroaching into human settlements.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)