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Pilot whales die after 198 stranded on New Zealand beach
Topic Started: 13 Feb 2015, 11:50 PM (19 Views)
skibboy
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13 February 2015

Pilot whales die after 198 stranded on New Zealand beach

Posted Image
A conservation worker tends some of the beached whales

Almost 200 pilot whales have stranded themselves on New Zealand's South Island, as rescuers and volunteers raced to refloat them.

Two dozen of the 198 whales found on Farewell Spit, Golden Bay, had already died, the conservation department said.

If the attempt to refloat them on Friday is unsuccessful, rescuers will have to wait 24 hours for high tide to try again.

A local official said it is the biggest beaching incident in 10-15 years.

"Because there's just so many whales, there are a couple of spots where a lot would gather together and that's kind of problematic from the aspect that you can't get in there, it's just too dangerous," said Mike Ogle, a local conservation ranger.

Farewell Spit has been the location of many whale strandings.

Experts say its shallow waters seems to confuse whales and hinder their ability to navigate.

Posted Image

Once they are stranded, whales can suffer from dehydration and sunburn.

Pilot whales can grow to about 20ft (6 metres) and are the most common species of whale in New Zealand's waters.

Andrew Lamason from the Department Of Conservation said it could take days to refloat the whales and even then there would be no guarantees they would survive.

"We've had plenty times in the past where the pods have gone out to sea and turned around and come back again," Mr Lamason said. "We're preparing for a big few days."

Scientists do not know what causes groups of whales to beach themselves.

Posted Image
File photo of pilot whales

Source: Posted Image
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skibboy
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Over 100 whales dead after washing up on New Zealand beach

By Greg Botelho, CNN
February 14, 2015

(CNN)Scores of whales stranded on a remote New Zealand beach got back in the water, only to return to land -- leaving more than 100 of them dead and conservationists racing to save those clinging to life.

They are among the 198 pilot whales that got stuck Friday on Farewell Spit, a thin claw of land that reaches out into the sea from the northern tip of New Zealand's South Island.

The spit forms the top of Golden Bay, an area where whales get stranded frequently because of its protruding coastline, gently sloping beaches and system of currents.

When it first happened, conservationists -- 140 trained volunteers in the Golden Bay area as well as experts from New Zealand's Department of Conservation -- rushed to water down the giant mammals, cover them and ideally refloat them back into the water.

"Refloating stranded whales is a difficult and potentially dangerous job," Andrew Lamason, the department's services manager for Golden Bay, said Friday.

Thankfully, workers on the scene until about 8 p.m. Friday (2 a.m. ET) were successful in getting the whales back into the open water -- albeit not before at least 24 whales had already died.

But it didn't last.

According to the Pacific island nation's Department of Conservation, "Unfortunately, the whales restranded, this time closer to the base of Farewell Spit.

That spurred government staff, the trained volunteers and members of the public to head to this beach early Saturday.

As of 11:30 a.m. (7:30 p.m. ET Friday), 103 whales were confirmed dead.

"People are working with about 60 living whales," the New Zealand agency said then on its website. "... It is very cold and windy at the site."

The stranding of large sea mammals -- something that usually happens naturally -- is nothing new to New Zealand, where the Department of Conservation responds, on average, to 85 such incidents a year.

But most of the time, it's just one or two whales or dolphins.

Mass strandings are rare, especially on the scale of what's happening around Golden Bay.

CNN's Jethro Mullen and Mitra Mobasherat contributed to this report.

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