Overview

Tembe Elephant Park is situated in the north eastern corner of South Africa Africa. The Park is some 30 000 square kilometres in size. It has an extraordinary bio-diversity in both fauna and flora.

Mashlasela Hide is a wooden structure built on stilts which overlooks a waterhole which has an abundance of wildlife.

The location and views are best expressed with Google Earth The picture below is the water hole,  named Mahlasela, Mahlasela Hide - Tembe Elephant Parkwhere the camera is situated. The advantage of a waterhole location is the (only relative) predictability that elephants will come to the waterhole to drink and enjoy mud-baths.But the elephants will NOT be there all the time. The herds range over a park of hundreds of square kilometres. Some patience is required!The Africa Web Cams are powered by solar panels. Images are transmitted to Internet servers by satellite.

Co-ordinates for the Water hole (Camera side) and the Tembe Safari Camp where the satellite equipment is situates are below.

 

Mahlasela Hide

 

 27 02' 48.36" South

32 26' 53.50"" East
Tembe Safari Camp 27 02' 48.36" South

32 25' 39.09" East
 
Technical - the way we make this possible

The operation and maintenance of the Web cam is technically complex. Access to the site is by 4 x 4 vehicle only. The Transmitter site is powered by means of  solar panels. This includes the camera, the Pan Tilt Zoom (PTZ) the UHF radio and the microwave system that transports the video signal. The descriptions below elude to the operation of the system and commences from the camera viz.

Camera - zoom lens - microwave transmitter - microwave receiver, de-multiplexing & encoding - transport to the internet.
The hide The hide is manufactured from treated wood. It has a grass thatched roof and is built on stilts to give the observers a vantage.  
Camera The camera is a fixed CS type camera which has a 85mm zoom lens attached to it. This is powered by a solar panel which charge a bank of batteries - 300aH in size.

Transmitter The microwave transmitter operates at a microwave frequency to transport the video signal some 2.1Km to the receiver.  
Receiver The receiver is mounted on a 12m steel lattice tower some 2.1Km from the transmitter. The height is required to transport the signal over the top of the trees.  
Video capture Video is translated from the the received signal to the computer via a video capture card. A program captures the video and FTP it to our server where we place it on the internet  
     
     
 

 
 
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