Elephant rampages through Indian city flipping rickshaws (video)

An elephant appeared to turn aggressive during a religious festival in the city of Kozhikode in India recently, taking the priest sitting on his back for a wild and destructive ride in the process.

The elephant first targeted an auto-rickshaw; the footage shows the animal thrashing its trunk against the vehicle which was parked on the street.

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The elephant then drives his powerful tusks into the machine and flips it on itself over and over again.

Civilians on the street were no doubt terrified as to what this huge and powerful animal would do next.

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The priest on the elephant's back had to hold on for dear life until he took the opportunity to jump onto a nearby roof for safety.

It's not the only animal to wreak havoc in India in recent months.

At the end of last year residents of Jaipur were thrown into panic when a leopard was spotted running loose through the area. The distressed animal raced through mobs of terrified people before the Indian Forest Department team captured the animal and took him to a local zoo for medical examination before he was released back into the wild.