Elephant impales a Buffalo

One big Buffalo met a horrific death at the tusks of a much larger animal. The Buffalo had been sleeping in the shade of a tree when a female elephant came upon it suddenly, stunned, the buffalo charged at her and sealed its fate. He headbutted her prompting her to retaliate, the elephant impaled him and shook him to death with its tusks. See more photos after the cut...

The buffalo did not die immediately and rangers at the reserve think the animal must have been unwell to act so out of character. The incident played out at the Maasai Marai reserve in Kenya and was captured by amateur photographer, Kimberly Maurer, 56, who was on holiday at the reserve. She said:

'I started looking through the images on the back of my camera immediately after the attack and became very excited to discover that I had actually captured the event in detail. This photograph was, no doubt, a once-in-a-lifetime capture for me. As you would imagine, his carcass was a meal for another animal or two.'