COIMBATORE: A 75-year-old man was attacked and killed by a wild elephant in front of his house at Vanjiamman Nagar near Thondamuthur on the outskirts of the city in the early hours of Saturday.
Two youths were injured while trying to escape from the tusker, which charged towards them.
A forest officer identified the deceased as P Arumugam. He said the elderly man was standing in front of his house around 6.20am when the tusker pushed him down with its trunk, killing him on the spot. “Meanwhile, the youths, K Arusamy and M Muthu, both aged 19, raised an alarm to divert the attention of the tusker, which then charged towards them. They ran and fell down on the road, injuring themselves,” the officer said.
Vanjiamman Nagar is located just 3.5km away from the reserve forest that fall under Kembanur beat.
Pointing out that a team of anti-depredation watchers (ADWs) was engaged in chasing away a wild elephant out of Ichikuzhi area, which is around 5km away from Vanjiamman Nagar, the officer said the team, along with another ADWs team that was patrolling Dhaliyur area, reached the spot and chased the tusker away into the Attukkal reserve forest area. They also took the injured youths to a nearby private hospital, where they were treated as outpatients.