00:00 The last of nearly 100 pilot whales that had stranded themselves on a beach in Western
00:19 Australia had been eventually euthanized after multiple attempts to rescue them failed.
00:25 The long-finned whales had beached themselves on Tuesday on the Shanes Beach, south of the
00:29 capital Perth.
00:31 Australia had announced yesterday that 51 of those whales had already died.
00:35 Eventually, the remaining 45 had to be put down after efforts to lead them deeper into
00:41 the water failed.
00:43 Officials said that they were forced to make the difficult decision to avoid prolonged
00:47 suffering.
00:48 More than 250 volunteers and a team comprising marine life experts had joined a rescue mission
00:54 to try and persuade the remaining 45 whales to the ocean.
00:57 But the Parks and Wildlife Service of Western Australia said that the surviving whales later
01:03 re-stranded themselves, with experts concluding that euthanizing them was the best option
01:08 to avoid prolonging their suffering.
01:10 Once a pilot whale, which can grow up to 24 feet in length and weigh up to 6,600 pounds,
01:17 is out of the water, its organs can be gradually crushed under its own weight.
01:22 Even when whales are successfully returned to the sea, they will often strand themselves
01:26 again.
01:27 Long-finned pilot whales are identified by their black color and bulbous foreheads.
01:32 They can be found in waters of the Southern Hemisphere and North Atlantic Ocean.
01:36 These mammals are highly social, who often maintain complex familial relationships with
01:41 their pods from birth.
01:42 If one animal is in difficulty and becomes stranded, the rest of the group, or at least
01:47 some of them, will follow that animal in trouble and will get stranded as well.
01:53 This is not the first instance of stranding of pilot whales.
01:56 There have been several instances of pilot whales stranding themselves, and pilot whales
02:00 stranding are common across the world.
02:03 Last September, around 200 were beached along the coast of Tasmania.
02:07 Of that number, only 35 had survived and were re-floated.
02:12 Tasmania's largest stranding was in 2020, when more than 450 pilot whales were found.
02:17 Earlier this month, a pod of more than 50 pilot whales had died after a mass stranding
02:22 on a north-western Scottish island on the Isle of Lois.
02:26 Wildlife experts speculate that beaching could be an indicator of stress or illness within
02:31 the pod, but the reasons will continue to remain a mystery.
02:40 [BLANK_AUDIO]
Comments