South African rhino that survived attack dies of infection

JOHANNESBURG – A South African rhino who was named Hope after she survived a 2015 attack by poachers who hacked off her horns and part of her face has died.

Saving the Survivors, a conservation group that performed multiple medical procedures on Hope’s mutilated face, said on Facebook on Monday that the rhino appeared to have died of a bacterial infection in an intestine.

The group says the grievously injured Hope wandered for days after poachers darted her in South Africa’s Eastern Cape province in April last year.

Several wildlife veterinarians and other workers had dedicated themselves to reconstructing Hope’s face, which had a gaping wound that left her sinus cavities exposed. They had said the rhino deserved treatment as long as there was a chance of recovery and, eventually, giving birth.