Elephant Mundi Jets to Freedom After 35 Years In Solitary

Mundi is a 41-year-old African savannah elephant who spent 35 years alone in a small enclosure at Puerto Rico’s Mayaguez Zoo. The troubled zoo was closed for good this year, and Mundi was relocated to the comparatively luxurious Elephant Refuge North America in Georgia.

The old girl made friends immediately with a pair of Asian elephants, female Tarra and male Bo. After decades of living alone in a quarter-acre confinement, Mundi will spend the rest of her life in a 850-acre natural habitat built specially for elephants.

Mundi was born in 1982 at Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe, but was orphaned after a mass culling ordered by the government decimated her herd. She was brought to the US in 1984, and spent a miserable four years as an attraction in cheap roadside zoos. After an injury left her blind in one eye, Mundi was sold to the Mayaguez Zoo, where she spent the next three and a half decades, alone but for gawping visitors.

The zoo was shut down in 2017 due to damage from Hurricane Maria and never reopened after the US Department of Agriculture canceled the zoo’s exhibitor license after multiple violations. Many of the animals have since been relocated in sanctuaries across the US; Mundi finally won her freedom this week.

Mundi flew off the island on a chartered 747 to Jacksonville, Florida, then was driven the rest of the way to ERNA in Attapulgus, Georgia. One of her first activities at the new place was to meet and greet her new friends. They appeared to welcome the new resident. Mundi will now have the freedom to socialize and roam a bit. 

The sanctuary says it can accommodate up to ten elephants on the grounds, so Mundi may get to make even more friends. 

Watch Mundi’s first moments at her new digs, where she greets her new friends.

Photo credit: Katie Bryden / World Animal Protection