An American animal researcher was trampled to death by an elephant while studying at a national park in Zambia — and her shrieks of fear may have saved her colleagues' lives, officials said.

Margarita Metallinou, 29, was killed last Thursday in the Kafue National Park in central Zambia where she and two other coworkers were roaming without game rangers, Zambia's Central Province Police Commissioner Lombe Kamukoshi told local media.

The post-doctoral researcher at Villanova University in Pennsylvania saw the charging elephant and screamed, alerting her fellow researchers in time for them to run away, police said.

Margarita Metallinou, 29, was a post-doctoral researcher from Villanova University in Pennsylvania.

Metallinou had traveled to Zambia on a research trip to sample lizards and learn how they are being impacted by climate change, Villanova University spokesman Jonathan Gust said in a statement.

She has been working for the university's biology department since 2014.

A charging elephant killed a 29-year-old animal researcher in Zambia, officials said.
Before that, she studied at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, completing her PhD at the Institute of Evolutionary Biology in Barcelona.

"She always showed an enthusiastic behavior towards scientific challenges and was able to create a stimulating atmosphere around her," IBE said in a statement. "Although she is not anymore among us, her memories will live on."

The tragedy follows last month's death of Kate Chappell, an American woman who was mauled to death by a lion while on a South African safari.