Rhinoceros

:For other uses of the term see Rhinoceros (disambiguation).

Nature's firefighter

There are a number of legends about rhinoceroses stamping out fire. The story seems to have been common in Malaysia and Burma.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

This type of rhinoceros even had a special name in Malay, 'badak api', where badak means rhinoceros and api means fire. The animal would come when a fire is lit in the forest and stamp it out.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Whether or not there is any truth to this has not yet been proven. Suffice it to say that there has been no sighting of this phenomenon in recent history, something which may stem from the fact that rhinoceros sightings overall in South East Asia have become very rare, largely due to widespread illegal poaching of the critically endangered animal.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~