Australian Story: Mar 4

Tonight’s Australian Story features three young Australians helping to save an orphaned Sumatran baby elephant.

A year ago three young Australians Amanda, Murray Munro and Bruce who once worked at Steve Irwin’s Australia Zoo knew nothing about elephants.

Then they ‘fell in love’ with a starving, orphaned baby elephant from Sumatra and saved her from likely death – thanks to Irwin’s father Bob and a social media campaign that’s helping raise $2,000 a month to supply baby Bona with special elephant milk.

Putting their normal lives on hold, they put all their efforts and focus on nursing her back to health. Today she’s a two-year-old toddler living with her foster mother Aswita in an elephant conservation centre in Indonesia.

She’s being trained for a brighter future on poacher patrol and to educate youngsters about the plight of Sumatran elephants – it’s estimated there are only 2,000 Sumatran elephants left in the wild and with their habitat being destroyed every day with the establishment of palm oil plantations and mining ventures their future looks grim.

Amanda, Murray and Bruce say they are committed to Bona and her safe, happy and healthy future.

Bob Irwin has supported their campaign from the beginning. Mr Irwin says he still remembers how devastated Steve was by his own encounter with a terminally ill young elephant and his inability to save its life.

“I just suddenly felt like it was our responsibility to do something. I mean, as far as we knew, there were only three of us that knew of this little starving elephant and it was almost like someone had dropped you know an abandoned puppy in a box on our doorstep.” Amanda French

“For me, personally, I couldn’t just sit around and watch Bona starve to death, much the same as Murray and Amanda, we just could not sit around and let that happen.” Bruce Levick

“Steve’s legacy still lives on and I just feel so proud of the fact that all those years and all that work that he did is still going on many years now since his passing.” Bob Irwin

“I actually started to get a little bit of emotional watching that video, not just because it was Steve but because he knew that he may have been the last person to show that baby elephant any type of love whatsoever.” Bob Irwin

8pm Monday on ABC1.