Carrie Johnson's charity will fly a herd of elephants from a Kent zoo to Kenya in a 'world first' rewilding project.
The Aspinall Foundation announced it will transport a total of thirteen elephants - weighing 25 tonnes - more than 4,000 miles on a Boeing 747 to a secret location in Kenya in a 'ground-breaking step for this country and the conservation movement'.
The herd of elephants, which includes three calves and a 34-year-old matriarch, currently live on an eight-acre enclosure at Howletts Wild Animal Park in Kent.
But after months of organising, including purchasing purpose-made crates to transport the animals, the elephants will fly to Kenya where they will be part of a conservation project.
They will spend six months being observed by conservationists before they are released back into the wild to roam free as part of a project that is being run with the Kenya Wildlife Service and the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust.
The charity fronted by Carrie Johnson will fly 13 elephants from Howletts Wild Animal Park in Kent to Kenya
The Aspinall Foundation (chairman of the foundation Damian Aspinall with Carrie Johnson) announced it will transport the elephants to secret location in Kenya in a 'ground-breaking step for this country and the conservation movement'
Damian Aspinall, chairman of The Aspinall Foundation, told the Daily Telegraph: 'This is an incredibly exciting project and a genuine world-first. As with any conservation project of this magnitude, there are obviously big risks, but we consider them well worth it to get these magnificent beasts back into the wild where they belong.
'By supporting the project, members of the public will be part of conservation history, helping to restore an iconic species to its ancestral homeland.
'If this is successful, I would love to see elephants held in captivity all over the world be rewilded too.'
During the 1980s, an attempt was made to transfer an African elephant from London Zoo to Whipsnade, which lies just a few miles away.
However the London Zoo elephant was kept in its travelling enclosure for too long and collapsed and later died.
The Aspinall Foundation, which was founded in 1984, now hope the 13 elephants will be able to start a new life in the wilds of Africa in 'an
