Rescuers trying to save whales
2004-11-29 06:51
Sydney - Rescue teams struggled on Monday to prevent a pod of about 20 whales beaching in an area off Australia's south coast where 80 whales and dolphins died after stranding themselves at the weekend.
The stranded mammals - 55 long-fin pilot whales and 25 bottlenose dolphins - died on King Island's Sea Elephant Bay in the Bass Strait despite efforts to save them.
Local police herded a further 30 dolphins and 12 whales out to sea late on Sunday, but Warwick Brennan, a spokesperson for Tasmania's environment department, said a further group of about 20 whales had now been spotted a few hundred metres offshore.
These animals appeared to be moving freely and a whale rescue team would try to stop them joining the animals on the beach, he said.
"The team will be using boats to try to shepherd them away from the beach into deeper water," he said.
'Depressing sight'
Brennan said the success of the rescue would depend on the condition of the animals and the depth of the water.
Locals first noticed the stranded animals on Sunday afternoon and immediately pitched in to try to save them.
Brennan said the beach was a depressing sight on Monday morning.
"It is quite grim," he said. "You've got a large number of spectacular animals that are dead on the beach. There are some baby whales as well, so it's not a pleasant sight."
A team of scientists has gone to King Island to help with post-mortems as part of the process of trying to find out why the whales stranded themselves.
The weekend stranding was the second in a year involving bottlenose dolphins and pilot whales on Tasmania's west coast.