Elephants Face Electrocution Risk From Low-Hanging Power Lines in India

As elephants searched for higher ground to escape a recent flood in Kaziranga national park, one of the members of the herd was electrocuted by a low-lying power line.

Years of high-standing waters have eroded the bases of these power line posts, and they now sag and hang only five feet above the ground, according to The Guardian.

According to the Elephant Family, between 2000 and 2012 a total of 122 wild elephants died in Odisha, India, from low-hanging and poorly maintained power lines. The Elephant Family runs The Powerline Project, where they aim to prevent this from happening in the future. According to the organization, power companies don't follow height standards and they also install wires poorly.

"Electricity kills more elephants in parts of India than poachers do. In Karnataka, the number of elephants that are electrocuted is three to four times higher than poaching cases," T.R. Shankar Raman, from the Nature Conservation Foundation, told The Guardian.

The Elephant Family and the Wildlife Society of Odisha survey low-hanging high-tension wires throughout the state. They record GPS locations and plot them on maps. They also upload all their data to a database. From their surveys, they found that the most threatened areas lie among 104 locations plotted throughout the Rairakhol Division of Sambalpur District.

The Guardian also noted that in 2011, the Wildlife Society of Orissa identified 147 locations that had sagging power lines. Despite the potential threats, the power distribution companies claimed they were unable to fix them. In 2013, efforts were made to fix some of the power lines throughout the state, according to Biswajit Mohanty, secretary of the society, but more funds are needed to address those that remain too close to the ground.

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