The icon for Gorongosa is a lion. There used to be more than 500 lions in the Gorongosa ecosystem. But when all their prey was killed the lions disappeared and... at the time when I first came to Gorongosa there was thought maybe to be 30 lions left. But they were hard to find and not doing very well at all. Nothing would symbolize the rebirth of Gorongosa more than the return of lions. And so, in 2012 Paola Bouley arrived in Gorongosa to start a five-year long study. The first thing she had to do was to put some satellite collars on these lions so she could track where they go and figure out what they were doing and why they weren't recovering. And so, by filming lions I was going to help her. Literally, on my first day back in Gorongosa on this new project we put a satellite collar on the very first lion in Gorongosa. This guy. Paola named him M02. M for male and 02 because he was the second male lion that she saw in the park.

This is exactly what I was hoping for. That I would be able to get the coordinates from the satellite collar of the big male. And plug them into my GPS and be able to drive right to them. The Sungue Pride is a brand new family. M02 is only about four years old. With his mohawk he reminds me of Mr. T. The two mothers, they're a year younger. And the five cubs they're just a few months old.

Those cubs are so adorable, and when I spent time with them then I really got attached. And one day we came across the tiniest of the cubs and she had this terrible wound. Because she was a female she was a really important member of the pride. Because she would grow up one day to have her own cubs. And so, a decision was made that we should intervene and try to save this little cub's life. And so, the vet, Rui Branco, was called in and... to try to fix her up.

But now we have to find her. We decided to split teams to cover more ground. Tonga today has given her a name. What do you call her, Tonga?

Mkombozi.

It's a Swahili word that means the redeemer. Yeah, we're going to find these cubs whatever it takes. Day three. Now we're getting desperate. 

Other colleagues that were busy doing other things were called in. Only that big. Let's go.

Jeff and Tginga are expert lion trackers. If anyone can find Mkombozi, it's them.

We tracked and we tracked. We would find fresh tracks but we would never get her. And that was hard.

Hold on. Oh, shoot! Got another puncture. I have no idea where I'm going. I'm just following the GPS. Five days. Six days now. They were here. The search is still on and it's exhausting. Ah! I just hope we find her soon.

Where are you? Rui and Jeff just found two of the cubs. Rui, what do you see?

Rui: Well, I see that she is doing pretty, pretty well and she's great.

Hey! Oh, my god! I'm digging it. Finally we found them. Rui says that the cut's healing really well and he's not going to have to operate.

Rui: No infection, nothing. And she's the tiniest of the cubs. She recovered perfectly. I'm proud of them because of their resilience. It was one of the best moments in my life.

I would have been crushed if she would've died because you know, spending that much time with a little cub like that but I really, really got to like her after she survived that one. But one day this guy showed up in M02's territory. He was like nothing I'd ever seen before. We had no idea where he came from but he was wild. You can tell a lot about a lion when you look in its face. What's its life been like. The first time I filmed him is something I'll never forget. I'd recently built this low-angle camera mount for my Land Rover that attached to the side. And I made it for filming lions because with lions, you know you want to get down on their level. You see them in the eye. You don't want to look down on them. If anything you want to look up. But, you know... I'd never met a lion like this guy before. And when I-- One day Rui gave me his coordinates. He was out with the lion. And I was so excited, I came in way too fast. And I came in too close. And the next thing I knew I was in a stare down with this lion. And he was so close I felt like I could touch him. But all I could see was the scars on his face and his eyes staring straight down my lens. Over my radio I heard Rui say Whatever you're doing stop right now. And... I was in a very exposed position outside of my car. And I slowly panned the camera away from Nginga's glare while his tail twitched outside my frame, and... I braced myself because I heard the lion snarl and grunt. And then I heard the grass moving rapidly and I braced myself thinking, That's it, I'm done. But the lion had sprung the other way and disappeared into the tall grass. So from that time onward I always came at this lion with a lot more respect. I actually used to drop a camouflage veil in front of me. I ended up getting nice low-angle shots of him but... never that close again.

The battle between Nginga, the lion and M02 didn't last long. M02 lost and Nginga took his females. And you know how it works with lions. When there's a takeover the males will kill the cubs. It's just how they work.

Paola and Rui never gave up hope. We were going through some camera-trap photos and we were clicking through and boom! There's Layla... looking straight at us. Like, the most beautiful lion photo I've got off the remote camera. The cubs were only nine months old when Nginga showed up and ousted the father. They had to run for their lives. We weren't sure they'd be able to survive on their own.

Rui: And after a week or two as I'm driving in the park doing some other work, I drive into a bend and there's this beautiful lioness lying down. I drive close to her and she's calm, calm, calm. She stays there right next to us... When I look carefully to her, guess who? Mkombozi in great, great shape. And she's just killed a nyala that was her own size.

Last year we gave her the name Mkombozi which means the redeemer. Because we hoped she'd help lions make a comeback here. Now she can.

Thank you.