Google Street View has started Street View Imagery of Kenya at the Samburu National Reserve to help raise awareness of elephant conservation.
“We brought the Samburu elephants online so people can “meet” them, experience the beauty of their habitat and realize the need for urgent action to protect them,” said Ian Douglas Hamilton, the founder of Save the Elephants, in an open letter on the site.
Funded by the Samburu County government and in partnership with Save the Elephants, the project began last February when Google drove a Street View car on one of the park’s main roads.
Kenya Street View is one of 17 Google Treks that are more interactive than typing in a typical address: As you pass an elephant in the park using the white arrows, an information box appears describing the elephant’s name and family. One of the first elephants on view is Pilipili of the Spices family, whose name means “chile pepper” in Swahili.
The information boxes explain elephant facts — for instance, that Save the Elephants names elephant families by a theme, like the Royals (members of which include Elizabeth, Henry and Noor).
There is also a section on the five steps that the Samburu park takes to protect elephants: collaring, monitoring, patrolling, rehabilitating, planning.
This is not the park’s first collaboration with Google; the Lewa radio command center has been using Google Earth since 2007 to track movements of the elephants and other wildlife and help rangers determine if elephants are ever in danger.
Other Google Treks include the Galápagos Islands in Ecuador, the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and Pyramids of Giza in Egypt.