Nearly a year ago, the Buzz posted this 8-minute amateur video from YouTube called Battle at Kruger that showed an amazing - and at times brutal - natural struggle between a pride of lions, a herd of buffalo, and some crocodiles in a game reserve in South Africa.

Shot by David Budzinski, a tourist from Texas, this footage is truly stunning to watch, and to date has had over 32 million hits on YouTube! That’s a lot of people watching.

Well, it took a while, but the video’s popularity finally captured the attention of some big hitters in the cable television industry.

Last night, the National Geographic Channel (NGC) premiered an hour-long documentary detailing and analyzing those amazing 8 minutes captured on Mr. Budzinski’s consumer-model video camera. It’s believed to be the first hour-long documentary derived from a YouTube clip.

If you missed last night’s premiere, it repeats again at 9PM this Wednesday on the NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC CHANNEL. I’m sure there will be many more opportunities to see it as well, so check your local listing.

NOTE: In my original story of June 7, 2007, I had erroneously credited someone else (the person who had posted it on YouTube) as the shooter of this video. That error has been corrected.