From Concrete to Community: 6 Elephants Who Finally Made It to Sanctuary

Zoos have spent decades selling the public a fantasy: that an acre of concrete and a painted backdrop can substitute for the life of a wild animal built to walk 40 miles a day, live in multigenerational herds, and roam across hundreds of square miles. It can't. Every elephant born into that lie pays for it with arthritis, infection, isolation, and decades stolen from a life she never should have had to live in the first place.

But the cracks are showing: some zoos are quietly admitting what advocates have said for years—that keeping wild animals in captivity is not conservation—and are finally sending their elephants to real sanctuaries instead of another cage. Here are six elephants who made it out.

1. Mundi 

Mundi’s story starts with a massacre: In 1984, the Zimbabwean government slaughtered her herd and orphaned her at two years old. An American buyer scooped her up along with dozens of other calves and sold them off piecemeal to zoos, circuses, and private owners like inventory. 

Mundi was shuffled between facilities for years—attacked by another elephant along the way, leaving her blind in one eye with a shattered tusk—before she landed at the Mayagüez Zoo in Puerto Rico. There, she spent almost 35 years alone in a small enclosure with nothing but a dark indoor shelter to retreat to.

The zoo lost its exhibitor’s license in 2018 after inspectors found dozens of violations—and Mundi was left to rot in isolation for years afterward anyway, because a change in the Puerto Rico government tanked a planned transfer. It took a federal court order shutting the zoo down in 2023 before anyone moved.

World Animal Protection helped fund her relocation to Elephant Refuge North America, alongside Elephant Aid International and The Wild Animal Sanctuary, and in May 2023, at 41 years old, Mundi finally boarded a flight. She now lives in a protected area of 850 acres of forest, pasture, and lake, with companions Bo and Tarra—the first real freedom she’s had in her entire life.

2. Winky and 3. Wanda 

Long before “send them to sanctuary” was a rallying cry, two Asian elephants at the Detroit Zoo forced the issue. In 2004, then-director Ron Kagan looked at Winky and Wanda’s arthritis, their ruined feet, and years of brutal Michigan winters, and admitted what the zoo industry didn’t want to hear: no amount of upgrades can make a zoo exhibit a suitable home for an elephant.

He pushed to send them to the Performing Animal Welfare Society’s sanctuary in California—a move the zoo’s own accrediting body fought, preferring to just ship them to another zoo instead. Kagan didn’t cave to the industry pressure. In 2005, Winky and Wanda became the first elephants ever released by an AZA-accredited zoo purely on ethical grounds—proof that “accredited” has never meant “acceptable.”

At the sanctuary, they finally had acres to roam, warmth, and real medical care for joints wrecked by years of standing on concrete. Winky died in 2008 and Wanda in 2015, but both were fortunate to spend their final years in a more natural and open environment. Detroit Zoo, under Kagan’s leadership, has permanently closed its elephant exhibit.

4. Edie

Edie lived in Zoo Knoxville’s exhibit for more than 20 years after arriving in 2002. It wasn’t until 2022 that the zoo finally conceded its aging elephants—Jana, Edie, and Tonka—needed companionship and space that no zoo enclosure could offer.

In November 2023, Edie was finally released to The Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tennessee—3,000 acres built for elephants, not for foot traffic. There, at last, she got to be part of a real herd. After Tonka’s death—while he was awaiting transfer to sanctuary—the zoo permanently closed its elephant exhibit.

5. Donna

Donna was held at the Oakland Zoo for 34 years after arriving in 1990. After her only companions died—M’Dunda in 2019, Lisa in 2023—she was left completely alone, a death sentence for a species that cannot psychologically survive isolation.

Rather than trap another elephant in the same aging exhibit just to keep Donna company, the zoo finally let her go. She arrived at The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee in September 2023 and met her new herd—Flora, Tange, and Sukari—spending her final years with room to roam instead of a fence line to pace. 

6. Osh

Donna wasn’t the last elephant Oakland Zoo kept in their venue. Osh, a 30-year-old African elephant, was still there—and in August 2024, the zoo announced it would relocate him to sanctuary too, permanently closing its elephant exhibit for good. Osh was reunited with Donna at The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee, finally able to interact with his own species on his own terms instead of on a keeper’s schedule.

As World Animal Protection put it at the time, Osh’s move shouldn’t be treated as an exception—it should be the standard every zoo is held to. Oakland Zoo became the 41st US zoo to close or pledge to close its elephant exhibit after the transfer.

Happening Now: Patty, The Bronx Zoo’s Last Elephant

In one of America’s most famous zoos lives Patty the elephant. Patty hasn’t made it out yet, but for the first time in more than 50 years, there’s real hope she might. Patty was taken from the wild in India as a calf and has lived at the Bronx Zoo since 1973.

After the death of Happy earlier this year, Patty became the zoo’s sole remaining elephant—and the Wildlife Conservation Society, which runs the zoo, says it’s now weighing whether to send her to The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee, where she’d have 3,000 acres and 12 other elephants instead of a single enclosure in the Bronx. Zoo officials have visited the sanctuary to evaluate whether the move would be right for her, citing her age and the risks of transport, but no decision has been made as of publishing this article.

It shouldn’t have taken over 50 years and another elephant’s death to get here, and local animal advocates aren’t letting up. If the Bronx Zoo follows through, Patty could be the next name to add to this list. Until then, she’s a reminder that even “considering” sanctuary is only happening because people refused to stop asking.

Joyce Should Find Freedom Next

Right now, an elephant named Joyce is trapped in the same nightmare Mundi, Wanda, Winky, Osh, Edie, and Donna were—except Joyce’s chapter isn’t over yet. Joyce was torn from her herd in Zimbabwe as a calf in the 1980s in the same government culling operation that orphaned Mundi.

Since then, she’s been passed around circuses and zoos, and today she’s confined to a barren pen at Six Flags Great Adventure’s Wild Safari in New Jersey—roller coasters screaming overhead, safari trucks rumbling past, in a space a fraction of what she needs to simply exist as an elephant.

Mundi got out. Joyce is still waiting. World Animal Protection is demanding Six Flags:

• Permanently close its elephant exhibit and stop breeding or acquiring elephants for the Wild Safari
• Commit to a sanctuary placement for Joyce and the other elephants held there
• Set real, enforceable timelines, not vague promises

Joyce shouldn’t have to wait any longer. Add your name at FreeJoyce.org and help make sure Joyce is the next elephant to walk free.