SUPPLIED
050713:With its escape routes limited, this quick-thinking impala jumps through the open window of a Toyota Prado to evade a cheetah in the Kruger National Park this week. These images were taken from a cell phone video of the incident.Picture: Supplied
Durban – A video of an impala leaping into a vehicle full of tourists as it flees from a pair of cheetahs at the Kruger National Park has gone viral on YouTube and even enjoyed a mention on US talk show host Jay Leno’s The Tonight Show.
A Twitter user purporting to have been one of the tourists to get up, close and personal with the panicked doe posted a photo of the encounter on her profile, but attempts to contact her on Sunday were unsuccessful.
The Mercury published stills from the video last week. Filmed by a stunned onlooker, it shows a herd of impala bounding across the road as two cheetahs chase after them. The impala vanish into a thicket but, moments later, a female re-emerges with the predators hot on her heels. She leaps through the open window of a Toyota Prado and is met with screams of “open the door”.
She jumps out a few seconds later and the cheetahs slink away.
After it was posted on YouTube, the video received more than four million views and more than 1 000 comments.
Many were awe-struck at the rare sighting caught on video, like Miguel Morales who posted a message that read: “Oooooh that was amazing. That impala was so genius.”
Others were less impressed.
The video shows one of the occupants of the Prado leaning out of the window as he films the impalas.
Erzhik Tem said: “How stupid do you have to be to hang outside of the window with your phone when there are two cheetahs running five steps away?”
“That idiot sitting on the car’s window ledge pees me off big time,” wrote annie46664.
Pyrander said the video showed “humans ruining nature”.
“That impala was not fast enough to run and save itself, but human presence changed the natural outcome,” Pyrander said.
And Daniel Pav was convinced the video was “a fake”.
But Pretoria University student Samantha Pittendrigh told The Mercury last week she had seen the incident.
“I have never seen anything like this,” she said.
The Mercury
