Lifestyle

Mexican zoo live-streams birth of elephant named 'Zoom'

16 Aug 2020

An elephant calf is seen with its mother in the African Safari park in Puebla, Mexico.

A baby African elephant whose birth was live-streamed by a safari park in Mexico has been named Zoom after the video chat app made popular by the coronavirus pandemic.

The calf is the sixth born at the park in Puebla, southeast of the capital, to a herd of elephants rescued eight years ago in Namibia, where they were threatened by poachers.

"The birth of an elephant is difficult to see," said Frank Carlos Camacho, director of Africam Safari, where the baby elephant was seen Friday playing between its mother's legs.

"It's very useful for science, measuring times, fluid volumes, among other factors," he told the section of the media.

The park said its goal is for the elephants to eventually return to Africa.

Animal adoptions soar in Australia during coronavirus shutdown

Incredibly rare monkey born at Australian zoo

"They're not ours. They belong to the world," Camacho said.

"We want them to be in Africa, but the current conditions are difficult.

"People working in tourism were left without jobs due to the pandemic and they're looking for alternatives.

The outlook is terrible."