Two photos of a gorilla, one alive, one before dying, break the Internet

Hyderabad: More than a thousand words, photographs sometimes stay for a lifetime, and beyond that. The photographs of Ndakasi, a mountain gorilla, will haunt many for years to come.

Ndakasi’s first brush with fame was when she famously posed for a selfie with a ranger at Congo’s Virunga National Park. That photo went viral, and now years later, her last few hours in the arms of her caretaker and lifelong friend Andre Bauma, is breaking the Internet.

It was three days ago that the Virunga National Park announced via their official Twitter handle that Ndakasi had died at 14 after a long illness.

“It is with heartfelt sadness that Virunga announces the death of beloved orphaned mountain gorilla, Ndakasi, who had been under the care of the park’s Senkwekwe Center for more than a decade,” a tweet from the park said.

“Ndakasi took her final breath in the loving arms of her caretaker and lifelong friend, Andre Bauma,” it said, adding that she died on September 26 following a prolonged illness in which her condition rapidly deteriorated.

It is with heartfelt sadness that Virunga announces the death of beloved orphaned mountain gorilla, Ndakasi.

C’est avec une profonde tristese que Virunga annonce le décès du gorille de montagne orpheliné Ndakasi.https://t.co/GdkJbhWESz pic.twitter.com/bsCKdEq8tB

— Virunga NationalPark (@gorillacd) October 5, 2021

Ndakasi was just two months old when rangers found her clinging to the lifeless body of her mother who had been gunned down by armed militia in 2007.

The mountain gorilla’s life was featured in shows and the documentary film “Virunga,” and she gained internet fame in 2019 for a photo that featured her standing relaxed on two feet, with her belly out next to another gorilla, Ndeze, and with another ranger in the foreground taking the selfie.

Virunga National Park in eastern Congo is home to some of the world’s last mountain gorillas. Neighboring Rwanda and Uganda also have some of the mountain gorillas and together their population is more than 1,000.

Nearly 700 rangers in Virunga park risk their lives to protect its wildlife in a region that has seen more than two decades of armed conflict and instability, according to various media reports.

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