An intense video shows just what goes into saving the life of one of the largest land mammals on the planet .
A team of veterinarians, park staffers, and other volunteers scrambled to save the life of two elephants in Thailand after they fell into a hole in the ground.
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All’s well that ends well, and both elephants were saved — but the dramatic video is certainly not for the faint of heart.
It all went down in Nakhon Naytok Province in Thailand.
A mother and a baby elephant (not the ones seen here) found themselves in a predicament after the baby fell into a drainage hole. The mother elephant stood over her fallen baby, apparently unsure of what to do.
Things went from bad to worse.
In an effort to expedite the rescue and get the larger elephant out of the way, rescuers sedated the mother. This had the effect of knocking her into the same hole. Now, rescuers needed to save not one, but two elephants from the hole.
They used a crane to pull out the sedated mother.
It shouldn’t come as much surprise that elephants are heavy creatures, and it took a lot of lifting force to pull the mother out of the hole. Once she was out, the real work began.
Vets needed to perform CPR on the mother.
It’s unclear why the mother elephant was in such distress — perhaps she’d been over-sedated or had partially suffocated in the mud. In any case, frantic rescuers needed to push, shove, and even stomp on the elephant to her her heart going again.
The baby elephant was able to climb out of the hole.
None the worse for wear, the baby emerged from the hole and immediately went to its mother’s side. As she was still motionless on the ground, rescuers were likely fearing the worst.
With a start, she regained consciousness.
At this moment of the video, the mother elephant suddenly wakes up and carefully gets back on her feet. Her baby is clearly happy to see her moving again, and quickly begins suckling her.
It was an emotional scene for everyone involved.
“[It was] one of the most memorable rescues we’ve done,” said Dr. Chananya Kanchanasarak of the Khao Yai national park department. Video shows the emotional rescuers processing what they’ve just taken part in.
Mother and child retreat into the woods.
After the dramatic rescue, it appears that the mom and baby aren’t eager to stick around. They slowly walk back into the forest as the people who rescued them look on from a safe distance.
It’s a truly incredible video.
This video from CNN International shows some additional angles of the rescue, including the baby elephant emerging from the muddy hole in the ground.
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