Ernie Dosio lost his life during a hunting trip in the thick rainforest of Gabon. The 75-year-old American billionaire wine entrepreneur and hunter was fatally overwhelmed by a herd of five female forest elephants, accompanied by a cub, inside the Lope-Okanda national park.
Who is Ernie Dosio
Ernie Dosio, originally from Lodi, California, was a prominent figure in the US agricultural sector: he was known for having founded Pacific AgriLands, a company that manages over 12,000 acres of vineyards, but he was also a safari veteran with a vast collection of exotic trophies obtained over the decades through authorized hunting trips.
The charging of the elephants and the accident
Dosio was in Africa on a $40,000 hunt to kill a yellow-backed duiker, a rare species of forest antelope, when his group suddenly came across the pachyderms. The reaction of the animals, caught by surprise in an environment where dense vegetation reduces visibility to a few metres, was instantaneous and left the seventy-five-year-old no escape.
The forest elephant, despite being known for a generally shy nature, can weigh several tons and become extremely aggressive if it perceives a direct threat, particularly when it has to defend its cubs. During the sudden charge of the animals, the professional guide accompanying Dosio was hit first and thrown away, suffering serious injuries and losing his rifle. Due to strict local regulations on the importation of weapons, Dosio did not have his own rifles with him and was equipped exclusively with a smoothbore rifle provided by the organizers: left alone and unarmed in the face of a mass moving at 40 kilometers per hour, the man died instantly under the weight of the pack.
The safari operating company, “Collect Africa”, released a statement confirming that one of their clients lost his life following the accidental collision with the elephants and specified that the surviving guide is in serious physical condition. As reported by Guardianthe U.S. Embassy in Gabon is working in close coordination with local authorities to arrange for the repatriation of the body to California.