Rescue mission in Tasmania

More than a hundred residents of an Australian island pitched in to help save dozens of pilot whales and bottlenose dolphins that had stranded on a beach Sunday night. This Tasmanian Department of Primary Industries handout photo shows rescue workers trying to save some of the nearly 200 whales and several dolphins which have beached themselves on King Island off southern Australia on March 2, 2009. About 50 of 194 pilot whales and seven dolphins stranded on King Island between the Australian mainland and Tasmania were still alive, Tasmania’s Parks and Wildlife Service spokesman Chris Arthur said. Rescuers used jet skis, backhoes and human muscle to save dozens of whales and dolphins stranded on a beach in southern Australia today.

The 194 pilot whales and half a dozen bottlenose dolphins became stranded on Naracoopa Beach on Tasmania state’s King Island on Sunday evening – the fourth beaching incident in recent months in Tasmania. Strandings happen periodically in Tasmania as whales pass by during their migration to and from Antarctic waters, but scientists do not know why it happens. It is unusual, however, for whales and dolphins to get stranded together. Chris Arthur, of Tasmania’s Parks and Wildlife Service, says 54 whales and seven dolphins were still alive when the rescue effort began. At the end of the rescue mission 48 animals had been returned to the sea by officials and the more than 100 King Island residents who had volunteered to help.