Ramba the elephant spent 50 years all alone in a circus. The Asian elephant was first forced into circus life in Argentina and later in Chile. In 1997, she was “confiscated” from a circus called Los Tachuelas because she was suffering abuse and neglect.
Despite being “confiscated,” she actually had to stay with the circus, just wasn’t able to perform anymore. After many years of hard work on behalf of Chilean NGO Ecopolis and elephant experts Scott Blais and Kat Blais, Ramba was rescued and it marks the official end of performing circus elephants in Chile.
Ecopolis petitioned for her freedom for a long time and when the Chilean government finally agreed, they reached out to Scott Blais and Kat Blais.
They were able to get Ramba out of the circus, but she had to be temporarily placed in a roadside zoo while a permanent location was found for her.The goal was to get her into a sanctuary in the United States, but that turned out not to be possible.
This very long rescue attempt led Scott and Kat Blais to create the Global Sanctuary for Elephants! There was previously no sanctuary for elephants in South America. In order to create a place for Ramba and other rescued elephants, they created a large, beautiful refuge.
Scott Blais says, “We know that sanctuary life can make a profound difference to the health and well-being of captive elephants.
Our objective is to develop an international collaboration to ensure a safe, secure and humane future for captive elephants through the creation of spacious, holistic, natural habitat elephant sanctuaries.”
Ramba finally arrived at her destination on Friday, October 18th! She can be seen in the video below the morning after her arrival at the sanctuary.
One of the most amazing parts of Ramba’s happy ending is that she no longer has to be alone! She will be living with two other elephants. She was greeted by Rana, an elephant who spent years in isolation and arrived at the sanctuary in December.
She will also eventually meet Maia and Guida who were confiscated from a circus and spent five years in chains on a private farm awaiting refuge. She can be seen spending time with Rana in the adorable video below!
According to Good News Network, less than 250 of the 6,000 captive elephants in the world have been afforded the opportunity to live the rest of their life in a sanctuary. That is why facilities like Global Sanctuary for Elephants are necessary and important.
We are so happy their dedication to saving and rescuing elephants from cruel lives in captivity led to the creation of this great place!
Please sign this petition to demand on ban on using wild animals in circuses!
This article was first published by One Green Planet on 16 October 2019.
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