While on a mission trip to Zambia, Africa, a high school girl from Pennsylvania encountered an elephant that apparently did not like having its picture taken.
Jarrod Sechler, the Dean of Student Life at Grace Prep High School in State College, was shooting video of the students close to and even petting an elephant at a safari reserve when the unexpected occurred.
The elephant unfurled its trunk and knocked the phone out of the girl’s hand while knocking her backward into a boy. The girl then scrambled to get her phone as the elephant reached out for it while everyone had a good laugh.
“Yes, I had the wind knocked out of me, no it didn’t hurt, yes I’m okay, and yes I still love elephants!” the girl wrote in a description to ViralHog, which published Sechler’s video Thursday. “It took me a couple of minutes to fully process the fact that I just got smacked by a real living elephant.”
The students were on a 12-day mission trip with Heart of the Bride Ministries, and the incident occurred June 13 while they were walking to dinner near a safari reserve.
An elephant that is free to roam in its 10,000-acre reserve returned to the edge of its evening enclosure and reached out over the wall to the students.
“I stood there smiling with joy, as elephants are one of my favorite animals, so I started to take some photos,” the girl wrote. “I thought to myself, ‘Wow, no one is going to believe I was this close to a real live elephant,’ but boy did I get ‘close.’ Next thing I knew, wham!…
“This was a very shocking, interesting, and somewhat funny start to an amazing life-changing team experience. Not just because I was hit by an elephant, but because I had the privilege of working with such amazing people and built relationships I will remember forever. If I had to get whacked by an elephant to partner with this amazing ministry again, I would do it all over the same exact way!”
Photos courtesy of ViralHog.
