Wild Elephants on the Loose in China

Some stories stimulate the imagination more than others. Yesterday I heard about a herd of elephants on the loose in China and several tag-along thoughts popped into my head. One of these was the film 12 Monkeys with Brad Pitt and Bruce Willis. Wild animals on the loose. Sharknado came to mind as well, just because it is so bizarre. 

What happened is that 15 elephants left their nature preserve and began a road trip. As of today they have done about 1.1 million dollars damage to farmland, plundering and pillaging. According to a story in Travel & Leisure, 675 police, 62 emergency trucks, 12 drones and 11 tons of food have been deployed in an effort to keep the elephants from ransacking the city of Kumming, capital of Yunnan province.

The story also appeared in today's Wall Street Journal, with a somewhat comical observation that perhaps the leader of the herd "lacks experience and led the whole group astray." (This wouldn't be a veiled, tongue-in-cheek barb regarding our government leaders, would it?) The title of the piece is, "A Herd of Wild Elephants Wandering Across China Captivates Millions."

Now actually, they have only traversed about 300 miles and China is roughly the size of the U.S., so they've hardly wandered too far across China. And when you dig further, this herd is only about 15 in number. Whether the herd be large or small, the elephants are large and the story does have a weird factor.

Evidently millions in China have been watching this story unfold. Now, the story's been carried to the four corners of the world via news media and social media. Here's an ABC account with some footage of these lost vagabonds.  And here's a photo on Twitter of the sleeping herd with that darling little toddler scrunched between them.

I can't help but wonder what these elephants are thinking as they explore some of the cities they're passing through. 

To close this out, George Orwell once had to deal with an elephant out of its element when the young Orwell was stationed in India. I first wrote about that unhappy story here: Shooting An Elephant. My hope is that this unusual event will have a happier outcome for everyone, because the world world is watching.

Agatha Christie's last crime novel was titled Elephants Can Remember. Will this herd remember how to find their way home?

Here's a link to the WSJ story.