Do Elephants Run?

For days now, we’ve been wondering if elephants run.

As you drive through the national parks throughout Tanzania, it is easy to see when an elephant has been there before you. The trees are strewn about haphazardly, the grass trampled; large indentures remain where their hoofs have landed. But our question still remained, do elephants ever run?

We reasoned the answer to be no. Elephants have all the benefits of being a herbivore – endless options for breakfast, lunch and dinner – trees, leaves and grass for the taking and at the same time, all the benefits of a carnivore – in fact the elephant is the only mammal that we had ever seen make a lion flee. It was the true king of the jungle. But until today, we didn’t know the answer to the question – if elephants ever ran. We figured they didn’t need to, so they didn’t.

But Roz kept mentioning words like stampede and charging. Words we have heard associated with elephants, so the doubt was there. Plus when you really thought about it, how did elephants wreak all that havoc just moseying along at the pace we had seen? Today, we got our answer.

It was just after lunch at a rest stop within the limits of Norongoro Crater on our third day of our safari. There we were, the cook, Chris; our guide, Kipara; Roz; Javi and I finishing up our ridiculously sweet mango, sugar juice and stale bread sandwiches as we looked out over a picturesque lake framed by large Baob trees when Kipara exclaimed, “Elephant!”

To be honest, our reaction was slow. After three days of seeing more wild animals in one sitting than we could have ever possibly have imagined previously, the elephant cry no longer provoked the shrieks of wonderment they had just days earlier. It’s funny how that happens. Just prior to our visit to Norongoro and Serengetti National Park, we had been elephant obsessed. We couldn’t stop asking each other, “Wako wapi tembo? Where are the elephants?”

In fact Javi had missed his flight in part just to see elephants in close range. He had said, “If I don’t see elephants in Serengetti, I don’t care how much it costs or how much time it takes, I’ll go back to that island and see them there. I am not leaving the continent without seeing an elephant!” And now here he was too tired to even take out his camera as the elephant sauntered past our car not more than three feet away.

I asked the question we had been asking all week, “Do elephants run?” And just then, as if it had heard me, the elephant began to move faster. A full out gallop I wouldn’t call it, but a fast trot it definitely was. Something had piqued its curiosity or angered it or something and faster than one of us could scream, “Look!” the elephant was across the street charging the tourists on the shore of the lake.

Now if you have ever seen a horror movie, you can picture the way the people scattered as they caught glimpse of the three tons of gray flesh charging across the road. Not a Nightmare on Elmstreet type, but rather the ones where Godzilla or King Kong comes through town squashing anything and everything in his way inevitably only to be trapped and killed by the unexpected hero in the shadows. From the viewpoint across the road, we heard screams erupt as the people fled in panic to avoid uncertain death by elephant . . .That is, all but one.

And right there before our eyes, we watched as one young man in a red shirt turned around and stared, trapped like a deer in the headlights. At this point, our car had dissolved into a myriad of shrieks of fear and amazement. Every tourist-filled jeep across the parking area, ours notwithstanding, was mesmerized by the possibility of the unsightly death of this slow moving tourist, entranced by the train wreck as it unfolded in front of our very eyes.

The man, now suddenly very aware of his impending doom, began to scramble frantically. He turned around and tried to run as the elephant, now close enough o pick the man up with his long trunk and eat him for lunch let our a roar that I have only ever heard on televised nature shows in my lifetime. The man froze as the elephants’ two front legs came off the ground, letting out a second cry of anger. We were about to witness something very tragic and bloody right before our eyes and yet, we were unable to turn away. Someone yelled to the man and he looked over his shoulder at the advice being given to him and then did something that I can only describe as shrug, resigning himself to the unknown outcome of his actions. He sunk slowly to the ground and pulled his feet to his chest covering his head and neck. Our breath caught in our throat. The elephant stopped in mid air and veered slightly to the left as if stunned by the man’s bizarre chain of decisions.

In the distance, a jeep roared to life and tore across the dusty road revving its engine. The elephant now completely spooked, did what I could call as close to running as I ever seen and made its way up the windy road and out of the picnic area, his big ears flapping in the wind behind him. The red-clad man jumped to his feet, wiped the dirt from his khaki shorts and sauntered over to the rest of his party at the first jeep in the row, as if this experience had been the most normal one in the world. I am sure he had to change his undergarments.

Kipara looked up at us from the driver’s seat and remarked, “Did you get pictures of that stupid man? In twenty-three years of being a guide, I have never seen anything like that. It was an adventure! ”

Once the dust had settled and we could all stop screaming about what we had just seen, the debate began again. “So elephants do run!” I said to no one particular.

Javi replied, “He wasn’t running! Haven’t you ever noticed that when you run, both feet come off the ground? That elephant did not have both feet off the ground. He was not running!”

Roz retorted, “He might not have had both feet off the ground, but that elephant was pissed about something and he would have left a bloody mess if he had run over that dude. He was definitely running.”

Javi shrugged in response, not entirely convinced.

So I leave it to you . . . . do elephants run?