Botswana’s Okavango Delta is a sprawling inland floodplain home to a diverse array of animals. There is a brisk trade in canoe journeys for tourists, who can journey down the waterways past hippopotamuses, crocodiles, and elephants. But for one dugout canoe full of safari-goers, the trip turned terrifying when an elephant charged and then attacked their boat.
The whole incident was filmed by one of the tourists and uploaded to a conservation group on Facebook. In the footage, you can see a large bull elephant, a short distance away. He trumpets then charges at the canoes, using his tusks to upend the nearest one. People spill into the water, retreating, as guides continue shouting in an attempt to scare him off.
With everyone in the water, the chaos only continues. A mother and calf look on at a short distance as the bull charges one of the shocked people standing in knee-deep water. He knocks her over and uses his trunk to hold her under.
Luckily, he let her go after only a few seconds, and she was not seriously injured. In the final clip, he trumpets his anger one final time and rejoins the mother and calf. All three begin moving off as guides continue to shout.
Blurry camera footage captured the moment a furious bull elephant held a woman underwater as the guides and tourists watched in horror. Photo: Screenshot/Conservation National Parks Facebook
Why did this happen?
According to the witnesses, the bull became aggressive after guides, misjudging the safe distance, came too close to a mother with her calf. The bull was acting to drive off a perceived threat to the herd, not from random aggression.
Still, while his cause was understandable, the elephant could very well have killed one of the tourists. Several different companies run the canoe safaris in Okavango, but none have put out an official response.
Hopefully, this incident will lead to increased precaution. While elephants may not be the animal you’d think of first when you think of attacks on safari, it’s happened before. Just last July, two women were trampled by an elephant in Zambia while on safari. In the same area the year before, an elderly American was trampled as well. In March of 2024, an elephant attacked a safari truck full of tourists in South Africa.
Worldwide, elephants are responsible for as many as 500 human deaths every year, and that number is going up. As a recent study demonstrated, poaching, habitat loss and changing climate are leading to more human-elephant conflict. Another study found elephant attacks in Myanmar directly correlated with habitat destruction.
Elephants are highly intelligent, social animals that aren’t innately aggressive. Attacks happen when elephants are forced into human territory — or when humans force themselves into elephant territory.
