A moving story of deep devotion was featured in a photo uploaded to Instagram making many people around the world cry.
"It is with deep sadness that Virunga announces the death of its beloved orphaned mountain gorilla, Dakashi, who has been in the care of Senkweke Park Center for more than a decade," the caption below the photo reads in the official park account post. Congo.
The photo shows Dakashi spending her last moments in the arms of her trainer and the man who saved her life almost 15 years ago. The female gorilla's health had deteriorated in recent days after a serious illness.
It was 2007 when Andre Bauma found Dakasi, a few weeks old, next to her dead mother. The mother had been shot in the back of the head and the baby, then, weighed just over 5 kilos.
In 2019 the gorilla went viral after a selfie next to another orphaned gorilla, Deze and a park ranger. The extremely human attitude of the two animals had once again captivated the eyes.
The two were the first orphans to be cared for by workers in the Congo National Park, the center run by 49-year-old Andre Bauma, who in Dakashi's eyes was something of a father.
"Whenever she sees me, she climbs on my back, as she would with her mother," Bauma said in an earlier interview.
Following Dakashi's death, the park said massacres such as the one that killed her mother had ultimately led to major reforms that "significantly strengthened the protection of Virunga mountain gorillas."
During its lifetime, the Dakashi species increased by 47%, from 720 mountain gorillas in 2007 to about 1.063 in 2021.
cnn.gr