Original subtitles

In Africa's Great Rift Valley,

a ragged chain of magnificent volcanoes

dominates the surrounding savannahs.

Some are dead.

Others steam as they sleep.

And at least one is very much alive.

The most famous of all, the tallest volcano in the world

and an icon of Africa,

is the great white mountain -- Kilimanjaro.

Snow and ice so near the equator fires the imagination,

but Kili's pure white summit may soon be a thing of the past.

The glaciers at the top are steadily shrinking.

If the life-giving water runs out,

will the mountain and all that lives in its shadow die, too?

Kilimanjaro stands in Tanzania, East Africa,

just south of the Kenyan border.

Kilimanjaro is a colossus,

the largest freestanding mountain in the world.

It can not easily be brought to its knees.

Three degrees south of the equator,

Kili rises to a height of nearly six kilometers.

Its footprint covers over 1,600 kilometers,

twice the size of London.

The immense weight of this massive mountain has depressed

the surrounding plains by nearly 200 meters.

Its famous snows disguise its own violent volcanic origins.

It last exploded 400 years ago.

Since then, it's been sleeping

but could awake at any time.

Kili may be slumbering, but not far away

Ol Doinyo Lengai, the Maasais' sacred

Mountain of God, still breathes fire.

At 2,700 meters,

Ol Doinyo Lengai is a mountain in the making

and the only active volcano in the Great Rift.

Down in the depths of its crater,

molten lava can bubble up from open vents at any time.

The hot, black magma turns an ashen gray-white

as it cools and solidifies.

Lengai last erupted violently nearly 40 years ago,

and it smothered everything with a suffocating cloak of ash.

But life soon returned, even to the very top.

The klipspringer's truncated hooves

are adapted for rock climbing,

and its insulated coat enables it to withstand

freezing nights at high altitude.

Mount Meru erupted 80 kilometers to the west of Kili.

Although it appears a young volcano

with a near perfect cone,

Meru was once taller than its neighbor.

Today at just over 4,500 meters,

it's a mere relic of it's former self.

Volcanoes, for all their present tranquility,

are born of tumultuous times.

Kili lies on an intersection of major fault lines

in the Rift Valley.

It is built up of three volcanoes, not one.

Shira was once over 5,000 meters high.

Now its weathered and collapsed cone

is under 4,000 meters.

Mawenzi erupted 18 kilometers from Shira.

Half a million years ago, Kibo,

the highest at just under 5,800 meters,

grew in the middle on the shoulders of the others.

Of all the animals living in the shadow of Kilimanjaro,

none is more associated than elephants.

For generations, they roamed the length and breadth

of the great white mountain.

Now people have claimed Kili for themselves,

and these gentle giants are only found

on the northern and western slopes.

Today, their main stronghold is Amboseli National Park,

just over the Kenyan border below the northern foothills.

Elephants survive here because the park is protected

and the mountain is a great provider.

Kilimanjaro is so big,

it creates its own weather system.

When winds from the sea rise to the top of the mountain,

clouds form.

They deposit moisture, usually as snow on the peaks,

and this filters down through the porous larval rock

and a labyrinth of underground aquifers

until it surfaces in swamps and springs

in the heart of Amboseli.

Where there is water, there's life.

And when it rains at the mountain's feet,

there is new life.

Not a lot makes a mature elephant run.

Eager to quench their thirst and excited by the smell of water,

the herds charge down to the swamps.

Water is central to the lives of the Amboseli elephants.

Given a choice, they like to drink every day

and can swallow 11 liters of water at a time.

Water is also a coolant.

And muddy water acts as a natural sunscreen

and insect repellent.

Splashing about in mud also looks a lot of fun.

Egrets feed at the feet of giants.

They eat insects and perhaps reduce the number

plaguing the elephants.

Maybe this is why they're allowed to hitch a ride.

It's almost as if each bird has it's own steed.

A ton of elephant wading in the shallows disturbs a lot of mud

and all the creatures that lurk in it.

Spoonbills that have migrated from Europe

make the most of the opportunity.

Elephants cross to islands in Amboseli's swamps.

They're good swimmers.

Millions of years ago, their ancestors were aquatic.

They've even been seen swimming

an incredible 24 kilometers off the coast of Kenya.

An elephant's trunk is its most versatile tool.

Swamp grasses are not firmly rooted.

The elephants bite off the green shoots,

leaving roots and mud behind.

Crowned cranes coincide their breeding season

with the coming of the rains.

Their elaborate performance is designed to impress a mate.

Following the rain trail are the mighty herds.

Wildebeest wander the plains below the mountain,

forever in search of new grass.

And where there is prey, there are predators.

Although, success is not a given.

Elephants can give birth all year round,

but most are born after the rains.

This tiny baby is newborn.

It's still unsteady on its feet.

Its mother is anxious to join the rest of her family,

and here's the reason why.

A lion could kill an elephant calf,

but the risks of being injured

by such a powerful mother are too great.

In years of plentiful rainfall,

great gatherings of over 600 elephants

congregate in Amboseli's swamps,

forming one huge and spectacular herd.

For the adults, it's a time to meet up

with old acquaintances and new babies.

For the youngsters, it's an important time to learn

by watching the adults

and socializing with others of their own age.

It's like one big elephant festival.

This is a male in musth,

an Indian word meaning intoxicated.

Flooded with testosterone,

a musth male's prime objective is to find a mate.

With so many females congregating around the swamps,

there's no better time to be musth.

Each male will test every female he meets.

If she's not receptive to his advances,

he'll walk on to the next one.

His wanderings will take him far and wide

and well beyond the park boundaries.

Elephants cannot survive on marsh grasses and reeds alone.

They leave the protection of the park to browse on trees.

And when they do so, they're in danger.

And it's not just men with guns that are a threat.

This female returned to Amboseli's swamps

with a seriously swollen leg.

Researchers think she may have trodden

on poisoned nails or spikes.

She's been limping for months,

but fortunately, she's slowly getting better.

Another female was not so lucky.

The infection in her foot led to septicemia,

and she died of blood poisoning.

Elephants behave in mysterious ways around their dead.

As soon as they catch the scent of a skeleton

of one of their own, they go very quiet.

No one knows why they stroke or pick up the bones.

They don't behave in the same way

to the remains of any other wild animal.

We'll never know what's going on in their heads,

but they do seem to have some concept of death

and recognize what was another of their kind.

Snares are cheap, deadly, and indiscriminate killers.

They're set to catch small animals

for the illegal bush-meat trade,

but they trap anything that steps in them.

In its struggle to get free,

this young elephant has pulled the wire so tight,

it's cut through its leg right down to the bone.

Unless the snare is taken off, this baby will die.

Kenya's Wildlife Service has a policy

of only treating animals suffering at the hands of man.

To help in this case, they must isolate the stricken calf

and drive off its family.

The little Kili elephant has been darted,

and the snare is being removed.

Antibiotic injections will prevent infection

while the wound heals.

Elephants are fiercely protective of their young.

The matriarch of the family and the baby's mother

refuse to leave and could be dangerous.

An armed marksman stands guard just in case.

Within minutes, the operation is complete

and the vet is ready to inject an antidote to the anesthetic.

Although very frightened,

the family stay as close as they dare.

This is one very lucky elephant.

The vets reported that its chances for a full recovery

were high.

By mid- to late afternoon, the herds begin a march

that will take them well beyond the park boundary.

Many families move up the mountain,

where the higher ground and richer earth

produce more nutritious and tastier plants.

As they head towards the foothills,

they move into Maasai thornbush country.

Cattle are a Maasai's prize possession.

As long as no elephant kills a cow,

the Maasai accept the wild herds

grazing alongside their domestic animals.

This warrior tribe has a fearsome reputation,

but they don't kill game for meat,

neither will they tolerate outsiders hunting in their land.

For hundred of years, they've been unintentional protectors

of Kilimanjaro's wilderness and wildlife.

However, when rinderpest killed thousands of Maasai cattle,

the tribe was weakened,

and this allowed an invasion of strangers,

including hunters and poachers.

Ultimately, this led to the international demand for ivory

and the elephant's demise.

Although the Maasai do not hunt wildlife for food,

a few elephants are speared every year

by warriors proving their might and bravery.

These attacks are enough to keep the elephants wary.

Elephants have been trudging up Kilimanjaro

for thousands of years.

They move through the dry thornbush country

and up to the cooler meadows

found at around 2,000 meters.

This fertile belt is now intensively farmed,

and almost all of the elephants' traditional migration routes

have gone under the plow.

Here, even the Maasai are using their precious cattle

to cultivate the fields.

As farmers, rather than herdsmen,

they'll not be so willing to share their land with wildlife.

Increasingly, there are complaints about destroyed crops

and a need for more land.

There is one narrow corridor left

through which the elephants can move up to the forest,

but without good incentives to keep a safe passage open,

how long before people look to the corridor

to feed an ever-growing number of human mouths?

Crops are now planted right next to the forest.

Lush fields full of maize, wheat, and barley

are hard for wild animals to resist.

Blue or Sykes' monkeys cannot resist such sumptuous fare.

When people grow crops right next to the tree line,

they're inviting trouble.

Big grain farmers expect to lose a percentage of their crop.

Unfortunately, a single man with a slingshot has little effect.

Monkeys are intelligent.

They'll simply hide in the trees until he's passed.

True denizens of the forest, black-and-white colobus monkeys

were once a marksman's target.

Only 50 years ago,

capes made of their silky black-and-white coats

were coveted by the rich and famous.

Now they are protected and safe

to let their unearthly roars ring out across the trees.

The canopy is the monkeys' highway in the forest.

Many of the trees on Kili's gentler slopes

have been felled to make way for agriculture.

But between 2,000 and 3,000 meters up the mountain,

there's still some rainforest left.

And amazingly, there are elephants right up here --

Kilimanjaro's elusive forest elephants.

Shy and retiring, they try to stay hidden.

They are not a different species from the Amboseli families,

and the two types occasionally meet when their paths cross.

25 years ago, there were 1,000 forest elephants

on the mountain.

Now there are only 220.

Poaching for ivory reached fever pitch in the 1980s

and hit the Kili elephants badly.

Salt is one thing that will entice

even the most retiring animal out into the open.

Minerals are in short supply on the mountain.

They get washed away.

But there are exposed places in the forest

where mineral-rich veins in the soil

have been uncovered by erosion.

The forest elephants have the tools to mine for salt.

Above the forest, in a panorama

that conjures up images of goblins and elves,

tussock grasses and tree heathers

dominate the landscape.

Seeing elephants up here at 3,000 meters

seems somehow unearthly,

yet surprisingly for such big animals,

they can achieve great heights.

Above the moors, the landscape is stark,

vegetation sparse.

This is an unforgiving, alien world.

Here at 4,000 meters,

Kili's high plateau can't sustain most large mammals.

Only the tough and remarkably adaptable eland

can eke out a living.

One reason why there are so few large wild animals

on the mountain

is because there are so many of one animal in particular.

Conquering this mountain is the dream

of many visitors to Tanzania,

and about 20,000 hikers climb it every year.

Rubbish was a big problem,

but now most of the tour organizers abide by the motto,

"Leave Only Footprints."

But even with the best intentions,

there's always something left behind.

And if it's edible, it doesn't last very long.

Sudden changes in cloud cover and wind force

can cause a drop of 20 degrees in as little as 30 minutes.

At 4,000 meters, weird-looking giant groundsels

and lobelias are two of the few plants

that can cope with such fluctuating conditions.

After a night spent tightly closed,

lobelias open like a new flower to greet the rising sun.

Prehistoric-looking, 20-foot-high giant groundsels

never shed their old leaves.

Instead, they fold down around the trunk

to form a shaggy, insulating lagging

which prevents ice forming inside the stem.

The incredibly giant lobelias

are related to the popular plants

that people grow in hanging baskets in their gardens.

The tall flowers of giant lobelias grow

to one and a half meters in just a few weeks.

Living in a land of fierce winds,

these plants rely on birds to pollinate them.

The sunbird's long bill and tongue

gives it a great advantage in reaching the nectar

at the base of each flower.

As they sip the nectar,

even the chicks do their part in pollinating the flowers.

This iridescent little bird has an intimate relationship

with this astonishing plant

and is the only sunbird that can live at such great height.

Many insects attack giant groundsels and lobelias.

Little grubs and flies infest their leaf rosettes.

It's thought that the sunbirds come as much for them

as for the nectar.

So great is its height that nowhere in all of Africa

is harsher than Kilimanjaro's upper slopes.

It came as a great surprise

to the famous explorer Wilfred Thesiger

to encounter wild dogs at 5,800 meters.

One of his men photographed a dog

that had followed his party almost to the summit.

Porters tell stories of young boys who,

new to their job, lag behind in the high plateau

and fall prey to wild dogs.

And it's possible these aren't just fanciful tales.

There was a report in 1979 of a lone porter

being chased by a small pack.

It's said tourists rescued him, but not before he lost

his little finger to snapping canine jaws.

Agile dogs are one thing, but a lumbering elephant

up near the top would seem impossible.

Yet, a sun-bleached elephant skeleton was found years ago

at 4,500 meters.

Recently, this one was discovered

1,500 meters higher.

Perhaps poachers with guns on Kilimanjaro

forced a desperate elephant to trudge onwards and upwards

until it could climb no more.

Only the large bones are left on the mountain.

The bone breakers remove all the smaller ones.

Lammergiers, or bearded vultures,

Africa's largest birds of prey, eat bones.

Food is so sparse on these upper slopes

that the mountain can only support a few pairs.

They scour the land below for food,

soaring and gliding great distances.

This is one large animal that can get to the very top.

The crater at Kilimanjaro's summit

stretches over half a kilometer across.

Locked in by snow and ice, it's hard to believe

that it once boiled over with molten lava.

For now, the giant slumbers, but the soil in the crater

is hot enough to warm frozen feet.

As it sleeps, Kili exhales hot breath.

Fumaroles, or vents, release hot gasses,

showing that this mountain is far from dead.

Sulfur and carbonate residues from active vents

fetch a good price in the villages below.

This rare and hard-to-come-by crater salt

is used to induce a miscarriage, and in minute quantities,

it's said to cure a colicky baby.

Local tribes speak of aged elephants ascending Kili to die

by hurling themselves into its crater,

denying poachers of their precious prize.

Any man who dares can climb down into the ash pit

at the center of the crater.

But if he's greedy and takes the biggest tusks,

he'll be struck blind

and fated to meet a wretched end.

No elephant graveyard has ever been found,

but there is evidence of a broader deterioration.

Nothing is immune to the forces that shape our planet,

even the two and a half square kilometers of glaciers

right at the mountain's peak.

In these frozen, oxygen-starved heights, it's hard to believe

that the equator is just three degrees to the north

and the scorching plains

are just a few kilometers down below.

Fortunately, the glaciers are only the icing on the top.

The water that melts from them

simply evaporates into the thin air.

But what gives the mountain life is water from another source.

It's the forests that are essential.

This lush belt of trees absorbs rainfall

and moisture from the clouds.

The mosses and lichens that cover everything in the forest

act like a living sponge.

This is where most of the water comes from.

Destroy the forests,

and Kilimanjaro will be laid bare.

Then its slopes and surrounding plains will wither,

and everything living in its shadow,

including its most valuable and vulnerable animal,

will suffer.

Kili's rare forest elephants have survived, just.

Tear down the trees,

and they will have nowhere to hide.

But the elephants don't have to disappear with the glaciers.

Kilimanjaro may lose its tiara of ice,

but it will still snow at the summit.

The mountain won't lose its symbolic white crown.

As long as the forests remain intact,

the great white mountain will continue to give life

to all that lives in its shadow.