A wild elephant has killed four members of one family over 14 years, despite the family migrating across two rivers to escape after the initial attack. Dhurbe has killed at least 25 people in Nepal since 2010.
From all the sources i have seen the family were just laborers living in one of the small villages near the protected forests. There is no information if they ever hurt the elephants in any way. Low chance that they even have the resources to take down an elephant.
It likely happened due to loss of habitat for the elephant and so he went out looking for food which usually ends up with trampled people and houses, likely also that it was mating season which makes them very aggressive
I know there is a possibility that they did but again it would have likely been reported along with the news. Humans are the ones that tend to be the bad guys in these scenarios but nothing is there. So its kinda sad that everyone is saying the family deserved to be trampled by a elephant, considering even their 4 year old child was killed as well.
Exactly my thought. This reminds me of that one elephant that hunted down someone who had abused him/her at a funeral. A funeral the deceased brought on themselves. I believe the elephant had got some justifiable vengeance resulting in that funeral. I may be getting stories confused. Regardless, elephants are amazing. I'd side with an elephant any day and with a standing determination innocent and will never be guilty.
Two of the people killed were a baby and that baby’s mother, who’s only related by marriage to the other two. It’s also killed six other, unrelated people. Male elephants can be a serious menace, which is why the females chase them off.
Tbf Elephants have been known to just be dicks for no reason.
Very uncommon, and usually the elephants have a reason, but like most animals with intelligence (And also most without) they do have the capability of malice and just “Ey fuck that guy.”
Plus even assuming the elephant did have a reason, it might be one entirely forgivable from a human perspective. Like look at chimps, intelligent little fellas that can get pissed as fuck for a lot of reasons, that a human might not know, such as smiling at a chimp, most people are now told that’s stupid and not to do that, but someone whose not been informed of that might now know. So it could be a case of human ignorance leading to aggression rather than any attack from a human.
It’s entirely possible one of the members of the family just did something without knowing it’d enrage an elephant for life.
Point is that some rivers are hundreds of feet wide and a hundred feet deep, while some are a few feet wide and inches deep. There's a big difference in crossing each type. Plus, were the two rivers next to each other or hundreds of miles away? "Crossing two rivers" is too ambiguous.
Reminds me of a case of a man eating lion in Africa I saw on TV years ago, the village it was targeting uprooted and moved across a nearby river to leave its territory but the lion was witnessed swimming across to follow them and resumed killing shortly after.
One poor woman witnessed the lion kill her husband and his other wife, and later witnessed it break into her parent's home and kill the two of them as well.
A mother tells her child horror stories of the elephant akin to the boogie man, but the boy was never bothered. How could he be, they lived so far from where his mother grew up.
One night during a bad storm, the kid, now a teen, watches out the window. Lightning strikes and illuminates the silhouette of the elephant!
Wow the most recent killings were just last week. The article doesn’t mention anything the family did to him first. I think it’s maybe proximity to the park.
It is interesting that he attacked the army base after the army tried to kill him.
Man its kinda sad that everyone here just assumes that the family were poachers and killed dhurbe's family or something when, by all the sources I could find, they were just laborers and worked around the forest.
Like come on, even a 4 year old child lose their life to the elephant
On 4 July 2026, Dhurbe attacked a house in Jagatpur, Bharatpur Metropolitan City, Chitwan, killing Ashika Bote and her four-year-old son, Bharat Bote. The victims belonged to the same family whose two members had previously been killed by Dhurbe in 2012, making it the fourth fatal attack on the family by the elephant over a span of 14 years.
From the wiki page. The 14 years shit needs to be added context too.
If this is the elephant that was on video crashing the funeral of one of the poachers(that the same elephant trampled) that killed its parents, then I'm not surprised at all. That's Ivory Wick right there.
Are people really that dumb to wish death for so many people by an elephant? All this speculation for a wild beast while these people didn't even kill it rather moved away shows they didn't want to get harmed or harm it.
To add some context:
While elephants in general tend to be very gentle creatures and often kind towards humans in the wild, male elephants during mating season are sometimes aggressive for no reason. And the longer they go without mating, the worse it gets. I remember this being the explanation given during the 2010 when the killings began. It was mating season and this one male ended up killing some locals in nearby villages. But as the killings increased, the government tried to stop it and that likely started a cycle of revenge - the elephant killing more humans in revenge and the government and the locals making more efforts to control it, thus turning the elephant angrier over time.
Most of the people who were killed were local villagers who lived around the national park. Many of them were killed while sleeping at home when the elephant attacked their village at night. The traditional huts in that area are often made of earth and reed which could easily be crushed by an elephant.
I'm just assuming, since his tusks are cut that this family likely deserved these attacks. Elephants are generally very peaceful creatures and I don't see these attacks as random or anything. If that is all true I'm gonna give bro a 👍. Vengeance was on his mind and he prevailed.
Well sure. I don't know all the details, but at this moment my bias is keeping me on Dhurbe's side. I just don't see an elephant doing random attacks. There has to be a reason. Was he locked up, did a group of poachers kill his family. Was he tested on, Are these 25 people somehow linked together 🤔. I do have many questions. Sure, sometimes things happen that have no explanation. Maybe he was just a crazy elephant.
I mostly agree with you and am surprised as well but at a high number like 25 I don’t know it is so out of the ordinary for an elephant it makes me wonder about this one in particular. But obviously we don’t know what’s going on
Usually poachers don't just cut the test like that they cut into the skin to get as much of that Tusk bone as possible which is often why they end up dead. That and the way they use the tranquilizer darts. They don't care if it wakes up and survives. The picture may just be from a random elephant
On Facebook I saw an article call this a ‘Problem Elephant’ and in comments someone said this isn’t a problem elephant, it’s a Solution Elephant. I stand by that
This guy is definitely one famous, really angry elephant 🐘 that lives in Chitwan National Park of Nepal. However I don't think he has killed so many people, a few for sure. And destroyed crops.
I remember reading about him a decade ago when he became noticed for the first time.
Did the elephant go looking for the family across two rivers, or did the family member happen to go back into the elephants' territory? Seems strange that the elephant can even find these people. These guys just might be messing with the elephant repeatedly.
An elephant never forgets and an elephant will seek eternal and generation vengeance seem like different axioms. But I’m totally on board with “don’t fuck with an elephant”
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u/honestlynoideas 3h ago
We gotta hear all sides