I’ve been shot before, it happens: Arrow shot ranger chases poacher

Shot through the face with an arrow, a game ranger continued the chase for an elephant poacher | WARNING: GRAPHIC PHOTO

Ranger William Hofmeyr, who was shot in the face by a homemade arrow while protecting a herd of elephants from poachers.

A game ranger who was shot with an arrow through his mouth by a poacher pursued the culprit for almost an hour, the shaft clenched between his teeth.

Unable to call for help on the radio because his mouth was so full of blood, William Hofmeyr, 51, who had been checking on a herd of elephants in an area of Kenya targeted by poachers, drove after his attacker through thick bush.

“It was painful, but I spent a lot of time in the military and in the police, so my first instinct was to go after him,’‘ Mr Hofmeyr told The Times.

“I’ve been shot before, it happens.”

So unwieldy was the homemade arrow, fashioned from a branch and a nail, that Mr Hofmeyr could not raise his rifle to his right shoulder, instead firing two warning shots from his left side, which made his attacker flee.

William Hofmeyr before the arrow was removed. Photo: Supplied

He chased his quarry for almost an hour but then lost his tracks and drove instead to a clinic, where the staff were too squeamish to remove the arrow. In the end the ranger did it himself, pulling the tip out through his mouth followed by the shaft.

“The clinic staff were too scared to hurt me, so I just told them to step aside and I would do it with my own hands. Old buffaloes don’t die, we just grow old,” he said.

The incident happened at the Olarro Conservancy, on the edge of the Maasai Mara game reserve on Kenya’s southern border with Tanzania. Mr Hofmeyr, from South Africa, is chief ranger at Olarro where there are no fences between the reserve and local communities.

He believes that the arrow attack was a deliberate attempt on his life and claims a price was put on his head after he dented poaching gangs’ profits. He was shot as he checked on a herd of elephants near a watering hole.

The arrow, made from a nail hammered flat and sunk into a wooden shaft, is the sort of crude weapon that is fashioned by local poachers. “It was a pretty good aim. An inch either side I would have been dead as it would have severed an artery,” Mr Hofmeyr said.

“He came after me and I ran to my car but couldn’t easily open the driver’s side because the arrow shaft was hooking on everything. I had to fire warning shots with my left hand and he ran off.’‘

Police said they were investigating but that the man’s tracks were disturbed by elephants.

— The Times