Elephants bound for zoos arrive in U.S. by 747

The children hovering near the fence were there to see the six elephants destined for the Sedgwick County Zoo. Many of the adults with them were excited to see the plane that brought the elephants – a 747.

The plane, which brought 17 elephants from Swaziland and dropped five off in Dallas early Friday morning, arrived at Wichita Eisenhower National Airport at 12:31 p.m. Friday with its controversial cargo. The final six elephants are destined for the Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha.

“This is just absolutely unbelievable,” Susan Weber said as she watched the painstaking process of transferring the elephants from the 744 to the flatbed trailers. “I’m pretty excited about it. I think I might have to camp out here until they’re finished.”

A coalition of animal protection organizations, including Animal Legal Defense Fund, PETA, Performing Animal Welfare Society and captive wildlife attorney Deborah Robinson, are demanding an inspection of the elephants by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

But none of that mattered to the more than two dozen people – about half of them young children – who came to the airport to witness the arrival of “our new residents,” as zoo spokeswoman Melissa Graham put it.

Gleeful shouts from the children were drowned out by the engines of the 747 as it pulled up next to where the elephants were to be unloaded.

Sierra Tinsley, 10, figures she’ll have the best story to share with her classmates at Pleasant Valley Elementary about what she did on spring break.

“I watched the elephants get off the plane,” she said proudly, pointing her thumbs toward herself.

Paige Koerner, 15, was so eager to see the elephants that she monitored the progress of the 747 from Africa to Wichita. She is in a zoology class at South High, and a field trip to the zoo is scheduled for next month.

“I can’t wait,” she said.

The large crates containing the elephants were tightly enclosed, with narrow slits providing ventilation but not much of a view for the crowd gathered outside the fence. That didn’t dim the enthusiasm much, though.

“It’s pretty darn exciting that Wichita, Kansas, can get this many elephants,” one woman gushed to no one in particular.

The delivery of the elephants drew criticism from animal protection organizations.

“Prioritizing dollars over elephant welfare is business as usual for Dallas Zoo Management,” Carney Anne Nasser, Animal Legal Defense Fund’s senior counsel for wildlife and regulatory affairs and a former assistant city attorney for the city of Dallas, said in a statement.

“Snatching elephants out of the wild and forcing them to live in tiny enclosures that deny them everything that is natural and important to them has nothing to do with legitimate conservation and everything to do with selling tickets.”

The animal protection coalition opposed the sale and importation of the elephants last November when the permit application was before U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services.

Veterinarians aboard the overseas flight reported that the elephants were eating, drinking and, in some cases, sleeping, Dennis Pate, executive director and CEO of Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium, said in a statement.

Graham characterized the relocation effort as “part of an ongoing rescue mission to provide safe haven and a more secure future” for the elephants.

This story was originally published March 11, 2016 at 4:25 PM with the headline "Elephants bound for zoos arrive in U.S. by 747."