Elephants Take Truck Odyssey from Calgary to D.C. Zoo

This story appears in the June 2 print edition of Transport Topics.

A pair of North American zoos used two tractors pulling drop-deck trailers to carry a trio of female Asian elephants to the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., from Calgary, Alberta, quickly and in comfort.

Zoos in the two cities hired Stephen Fritz Enterprises of Kingman, Arizona, to move Swarna, Kamala and her daughter Maharani 2,480 miles, including an international border crossing.

Each elephant had her own travel crate with steel frames and wooden linings that weighed about 11,000 pounds each.

They were escorted in a four-vehicle convoy, consisting of two heavy-duty rigs with two drivers each, and two recreational vehicles with a 12-person support staff of veterinarians, curators, keepers and others.

The group left the Calgary Zoo on the afternoon of May 20 and arrived at the National Zoo about 66 hours later on May 23.

Stephen Fritz, who owns the trucking company and has been moving elephants for 27 years, said two crews of two drivers complied with standard hours of service and did not ask for waivers.

“I didn’t drive on this trip — I was the fifth driver in case of emergency,” Fritz said.

Fritz used a Western Star 4900 with a step-deck trailer to haul Kamala and Maharani in a load that grossed out at 75,000 pounds, just below the standard 80,000-pound limit. The other tractor was a rental unit that pulled a double-drop trailer carrying Swarna solo.

The Calgary-to-Washington trip was particularly challenging because it was three elephants at once, but it was not Fritz’s longest run. He transported Calgary’s bull elephant to Bush Gardens in Tampa, Florida, in a 17,000-pound crate that is 11 feet tall. And he also managed the trip for an elephant moving from Auckland, New Zealand, to the San Diego Zoo, which included a long airplane ride.

The Calgary Zoo said in April 2012 it would discontinue its elephant exhibit, in part because the animals don’t do well in the cold of the Canadian Rockies. In contrast, the National Zoo, part of the Smithsonian Institution, has been trying to increase the size of its Asian elephant herd.

Tony Barthel, curator of large mammals at the National Zoo, said when the Canadian trio is released from their 30-day quarantine, they will join four other Asian elephants there.

He said that up until the 1980s, the elephants would have traveled by ship for an ocean crossing. Now they are most likely to move by plane. Asked if trains were an option within North America, Barthel said he focused on trucks because of timing.

“We wanted to minimize the animals’ time in the crates, so we went with trucks,” Barthel said.

Barthel and Fritz said the comfort of the elephants, including their psychological well-being, was of prime importance.

Therefore, the zoo personnel took possession of Fritz’s crates well ahead of the move so the elephants could get used to being in them.

Elephants like to sleep while standing and leaning against something, Fritz said, adding that the elephants are so massive it is dangerous for them to lie down for a long time. Therefore, the crates included emergency lift straps.

Barthel and Fritz said the crates are well-ventilated but hard to see into or out of. They do not want to attract onlookers while the animals are in transit.

They said the elephants stayed in their crates for the whole journey, even when they pulled into truck stops so the animals could feed on hay, grain, melons, grapes, popcorn and fresh water. Barthel said they stopped frequently to buy watermelons.

As is often the case with international shipping, the slowest part of the trip was at the border. The caravan crossed from Manitoba into North Dakota. The convoy had to deal with the U.S. Customs, the Agriculture Department and the Fish and Wildlife division of the Interior Department.

Fritz said they spent 2.5 hours at the border, even though the National Zoo’s registrar, who was part of the support crew, had extensive conversations with the inspectors beforehand and filed the appropriate permits.

Fritz had his two teams cap their speed at 65 miles per hour on highways. The four vehicles communicated via walkie-talkies and always traveled in the same order: double-elephant truck, RV, single-elephant truck and the second RV.

Had there been an emergency, the vehicles could have split up, but the convoy remained intact for the whole trip.

Because of the time of year, there was no need for temperature-controlled equipment. Barthel said elephants are like people and do very well when the temperature ranges from 50 degrees to 75 degrees Fahrenheit. Outside of that window, it becomes necessary to heat or air-condition them, he said.

The main business for Barthel and his wife deals with hay for horses. He got into the business in the 1980s when an elephant-keeper friend in San Diego needed to get an animal to Burbank, California, for an appearance on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.

“I was working construction and had a truck,” he said.

Having just returned to California after 15 days on the road, Fritz said, “We’re proud of what we do, but it does wear you out.”