Alcohol can lower an elephant's core body temperature.
Two elephants have been saved from the deadly Siberian cold by
drinking vodka, Russian officials say.
They say the animals had to be taken out into the bitter cold after
the wooden trailer they were travelling in caught fire in the
Novosibirsk region.
The elephants, aged 45 and 48, suffered frostbite to the tips of their
ears amid temperatures of -40C (-40F)
But they were warmed up by two cases of vodka mixed with warm water,
one official was quoted as saying.
"They started roaring like if they were in the jungle! Perhaps, they
were happy," the official told Russia's Ria Novosti news agency.
The animals continued their recovery in a heated garage of a local
college where they were brought by a truck under police escort.
The elephants belong to a Polish circus, which has been touring the
region, reports say.
Like with humans, alcohol can make animalsfeel warmer but it actually
lowers their core body temperature, scientists say.
But Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper quoted Novosibirsk zoo director
Rostislav Shilo as saying that the elephants were not harmed or
intoxicated by the vodka, and that without it they would have died of
hypothermia or pneumonia.
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