Wildlife Officials rescue baby elephant from a ditch. Elephant herd salutes the men before leaving

In Kerala, India, a baby elephant falls into a ditch (or an abandoned well) and gets trapped there. As the family of wild elephants watches and waits on the other side of the river, local people and forest officials use an earthmover to help the baby get out. 

Watch when they come running and welcoming the baby, checking whether it is fine. The incredible moment then occurs when the elephant family head turns and salutes the humans, thanking them for saving their little one..

There has been some confusion on whether the elephants were actually acknowledging the rescuers or not. Numerous scientific experiments have shown that elephants are emotional beings. Elephants are known to comfort other elephants in distress and stand beside them touching with trunks and making soft sounds. 


Here is a book by Virginia Morell - Animal Wise, which talks about the emotional intelligence of elephants available at amazon here -- https://amzn.to/2Xz0sep

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National geographic talks about this in detail, adopted from the above book here --https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/02/140221-elephants-poaching-empathy-grief-extinction-science/