Game Scout Hungwe's Ordeal

“The game scout was in a bad way, he had a horn through the side of his stomach, a horn through the top of his right shoulder, and the entire back of his thigh muscle had been ripped off right up to his buttocks… it looked fucking ugly.” Zimbabwean PH Craig Robinson in conversation with the author about game scout Hungwe’s goring by a buffalo in the Gonarezhou National Park.

PH Craig Robinson who related the story to me about Game Scout Hungwe's horrific goring by an injured buffalo bull. The buffalo bull depicted in this photograph is typical of the heavy bossed bulls of the Gonarezhou area.

Monday, 9 March 1987, dawned like any other summer day in Zimbabwe’s remote Gonarezhou National Park. This vast landmass with its prolific herds of big game lies in the country’s south-eastern corner. It has as one boundary, the international border with Mozambique. To the east and west, lie vast tribal areas. Poaching is not an uncommon problem, and for this very reason the park employs a fairly big team of game scouts to carry out anti-poaching patrols. And to police the park on a daily basis. Mabalauta field HQ is situated on the western boundary, and way to the east is the Chipinda Pools field HQ. Both stations have a warden in charge, but due to distance and sheer remoteness, they are only in radio contact with each other.

Patrols are normally carried out on foot, or with the aid of bicycles. Game scouts are also deployed by vehicle, to then commence patrolling back to HQ on foot using a pre-determined route which may take up to a week. The 'Gona' as it is often referred to by those who hold the area dear, can experience extremely high daytime temperatures, and high humidity during the rainy season. Patrol work is not without its dangers, not only from armed poachers, but also from the dangerous game inhabiting the area. Gonarezhou elephant are known for their truculence. The National Park's name Gonarezhou loosely translates from one of the Shona sub-clan dialects, to mean ‘A place for elephants.'

African buffalo are not only extremely tenacious, they are also unpredictable and should always be treated with the utmost respect. Sport hunters need to keep in mind a buffalo injury may not be due to a gunshot wound. It could be the result of fighting, a lion mauling, or a poacher's snare.

On this particular day a four-man game scout patrol departed Mabalauta on foot, their bicycles loaded with basic patrol needs for a possible 5 to 7 days. Mealie meal – their staple – and perhaps coffee, salt, sugar and some sun-dried meat cut into thin strips. Due to the logistical support problems associated with patrols, they were seldom of longer than 7 days duration. Each man also carried a sleeping bag, and possibly a small canvas ground sheet. In addition, they carried NATO G3 7,62mm combat rifles. Their task, aside from monitoring game was to find and apprehend poachers.

Game scout Hungwe who was part of the patrol was not new to the job, and he enjoyed his work. As per normal the scouts try to cover as much ground as they can before the heat of the day sets in. After arriving in their patrol area, they then seek a suitable patrol base site, and set up a fly-camp. From there, they ‘cross grain patrol' in different directions each day, ensuring too, that they checked the environs of all water holes. While on the move and although not heavily laden, they sometimes have to dismount from their bicycles and push them through the heavy sand. The patrol quite often ends up strung out as they alternate between pedalling and pushing.

On this particular day game scout Hungwe began to drop behind, his three companions steadily increasing the gap between them. This may not have worried him unduly as he still had them visual, and already knew where their pre-arranged campsite was to be located. Entering an avenue of thick mopane woodland and scrub he pedalled on. Masticated branches and fallen trees littered the roadway, evidence of an elephant herd having passed by during the previous night. On the odd occasion he no doubt noticed buffalo spoor and probably buffalo dung, together with that of many other species. Given the density of the scrub, visibility on either side of the track was down to mere metres.

A wounded buffalo may take a lot of killing due to their tenacity, high adrenalin, and determination when attacking a perceived threat.

Reaching a patch of particularly heavy sand, Hungwe alighted from his bicycle and proceeded to push it. Finally, and once more having got clear of the sandy belt, he decided to rest before continuing on his way. With his companions still visual to his front, he leant his bike against a tree and sauntered off the track to urinate. After having returned to his bike and lifted it free of the tree trunk it stood against, he was about to mount, when he noticed a drab shadow like, black mass, in the brush about thirty paces off to his right. Crouching slightly and taking a closer look, he soon discerned it was a solitary buffalo bull.

Zimbabwe’s Shangaan tribesmen who spend their lives living in close proximity to dangerous game often have a tendency to become blasé. Perhaps this was the case with game scout Hungwe, because he decided to notify his companions about what he had just observed. His mode of notification though, after he realised his companions had obviously cycled right past the motionless buffalo, was by way of loud shouts. And he shouted after them while standing holding his bicycle, and then looked back towards the buffalo. It was too late, as with rising panic he suddenly realised his day was about to rapidly go downhill because the enraged buffalo had already reached him.

Bellowing and grunting loudly, 1800 lbs of enraged musculature, horns, and plate-sized hooves flattened the hapless game scout and his puny bicycle. Within milliseconds man and bicycle had become separated, the buffalo choosing to stay with the man. Game scout Hungwe writhed and fought, his mind in turmoil as a heavy horn jabbed into his shoulder, the sheer pain of it nearly causing him to pass out. With his one arm now useless, he managed to wriggle away from the enraged animal, and finding his feet dodged around a bush. His escape was an exercise in futility because the buffalo ploughed straight through the bush, before once more pinning him to the ground. This time a horn tip penetrated the luckless Hungwe’s stomach, while the buffalo continued to hook and roll him along the ground, the flailing horns wreaking havoc with his one thigh muscle, ripping it from the bone. From the sheer pounding that his body had been subjected to, Hungwe then mercifully passed out.

A buffalo portrait by the author.

By this time his colleagues had arrived at the scene and were standing a little way off in a frightened huddle while trying to assess what best to do. They then hastily arrived at a joint decision to collectively open fire with their 7,62mm G3s. In the interim, however, game scout Hungwe had regained consciousness, and he fortunately had enough presence of mind to know that despite his acute pain, and sorry state, his colleagues’ bullets, slamming into the buffalo and into the ground around where he lay, could kill him just as easily as the buffalo could.

Deciding to play ‘possum’ he lay dead still, and by this time too, the buffalo had absorbed a number of 7,62mm military ball rounds, and leaving its victim, ran a short distance before collapsing and after one long drawn-out bellow, died. The three game scouts who came to their erstwhile colleague Hungwe’s rescue, had each expended a full twenty-round magazine of 7,62mm into the buffalo, totalling sixty rounds in all! Not a single round hit GS Hungwe!

Leaving the pain wracked and barely conscious Hungwe where he lay – the trio then high tailed it to a nearby safari camp, and sought the assistance of Professional Hunter Craig Robinson, who happened to be in camp. A radio call was made to Harare, requesting a casualty evacuation, however, by the time Robinson got to the scene, a National Parks department truck had already transported the horrifically injured game scout back to Mabalauta field station. PH Robinson was still at Mabalauta when the dead buffalo was brought in. He taped the horns and they measured 42˝ with 17˝ bosses. In a later conversation with me he recalled the buffalo had a huge body mass, estimated to be about 1800 lbs. The buffalo also had a stomach wound, caused not by a bullet, but by another buffalo, obviously the result of a fight. Of the sixty rounds fired, only twenty-six had actually hit the buffalo! Which doesn’t say much for the standard of the game scouts’ shooting.

Game scout Hungwe came into contact with the sulking buffalo at 0900hrs. He was finally airlifted from Mabalauta at 1630hrs, a seven and a half-hour time lapse, during which period he had only received the most rudimentary first aid. His bloodied, battered and broken body was covered in sand, leaves and twigs, yet he made a full recovery and was back on duty six months later. The tribal African’s ability to suffer and survive the most horrific injuries is quite astounding, a fact that has over the centuries been well documented in books and journals.

The above story forms one of a number about buffalo incidents in a Chapter Eleven titled Nyati - Africa's Most Tenacious, in my semi-autobiography Shadows in an African Twilight first published in 2008. The book Is available on Amazon.com in conventional paperback format, as an eBook, and as an audiobook. It was first uploaded onto Amazon in 2017.