Ooty: The injured elephant from Krishnagiri, which was shifted to Mudumalai Tiger Reserve (MTR) on Tuesday evening for treatment, succumbed to injuries on Wednesday afternoon.
The wild makhna elephant (tusk-less male jumbo), which sustained injuries on Monday morning when a bus rammed against it near Krishnagiri on the busy Chennai-Bengaluru NH, was brought to the Theppakadu elephant camp at MTR in a critical condition on Tuesday night, for treatment.
However, the efforts made by the foresters and the team of veterinary experts failed to yield any result as the makhna elephant died shortly after 12 noon on Wednesday. It was indeed a day of gloom at the elephant camp at MTR as the jumbo succumbed to injuries nearly 15 hours after it had arrived at the MTR elephant camp, without showing any signs of improvement.
Dr N.S.Manoharan, senior forest veterinary officer from Coimbatore, said that initially it was diagnosed that the lower portion of the hind limbs of the near 10-year-old makhna and the tail portion were functionless for the past two days.
“The X-ray analysis could be done only on certain portion of the body of the jumbo on the way to MTR on Tuesday. While there was no noticeable fracture in the lower hind limbs, the way it lost its movement made us think that it might have suffered deeper internal injuries and could have suffered from injury to the spinal cord, that probably crippled the movements in the hind limbs and the tail. We began our treatment on Tuesday night itself. But, around 12.30 pm on Wednesday it died suddenly after making a mild noise. “The post-mortem done on Wednesday afternoon revealed that the jumbo suffered fractures in the hip region and internal injuries. The severe internal injuries it suffered could have led to cardiac arrest and the jumbo died,” he said.
