**** 2023 update **** Coal Mines approach
Ecologically and economically vulnerable areas bordering Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Game Reserve are threatened by ‘get-rich-quick’ coal prospecting rights. Tony Carnie investigates for Our Burning Planet
***2020 update *** Suddenly lots of traffic
The Gods of internet traffic are fickle. The following two elephant encounter videos from our 2014 holiday in Hluhluwe/iMfolozi have been parked on Youtube ever since. In the last two months they have received over 40,000 views mostly from India mostly directly linked from Whatsap.
View from our car : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AngzDwA7ACc
From the car behind : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tz2VlLnoXMg
What should also be alongside is the view from the real carbon political driven world :
Tendele has an existing blasting operation at Somkhele, about ten kilometres east of the park, but managers gave undertakings nearly 15 years ago that the company would not touch coal reserves within the five-kilometre–wide wilderness buffer zone but he recently-appointed chief operating officer, Ms Jarmi Steyn, met the park custodian – Ezemvelo KwaZulu-Natal Wildlife – earlier this year to announce that the company wanted to mine less than one kilometre from the park boundary.
There seem to be no major legal hurdles to mining just outside the park, but Ezemvelo and several conservation groups fear that regular blasting, dust and other impacts will sound the death knell for the wilderness area, and harm the flagship Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park.
https://www.countrylife.co.za/wildlife-2/imfolozi-under-threat-----------
Ibutho Coal Pty Ltd has applied for a mining license to mine anthracite coal for the next 32 years in the Fuleni area bordering on the Wilderness section of the Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park. The mine would be mainly opencast and would operate for 24 hours, 365 days of the year.
https://saveourwilderness.org/about/the-fuleni-open-cast-coal-mine/
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Today, Wednesday 5th Feb 2014 we had a very special and privileged day in Hluhluwe/iMfolozi game park in Zululand South Africa. We saw for ourselves the Big Five animals, Lion, Cape Buffalo, Leopard, Elephant and Rhino. This was a very exciting day and an unusual occurrence as seeing any of the big cats is quite rare. The leopard sighting was very brief as it crossed the road and disappeared into the bush in the late afternoon. The lion in typical lazy attitude were dozing in a riverbed just by the entrance to the park.
We were lucky to see both rhino and elephant a couple of times during the day.
A big thanks to the workers and staff of KZN Wildlife for protecting and preserving these fabulous animals.
Finally a couple of Videos from the Elephant encounter above .
View from our car : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AngzDwA7ACc
From the car behind : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tz2VlLnoXMg
Cheers and take care out there in the wilds.