Whale stranded off Germany for days found stuck again
A humpback whale, which was released after being stranded in shallow water for several days at a resort on the Baltic Sea in Germany, was stranded again when it could not find its way back to the Atlantic Ocean.
Germans were fascinated by the complex and delicate efforts to rescue a 12-15 meter whale from a sandbar on Timmendorfer Strand earlier this week; the media sent out alerts with updates on the whale’s progress and broadcast live video from the scene.
The whale became a popular topic of conversation across the country, with people texting about the rescue effort.
An excavator was used on Thursday to dig an escape channel after unsuccessful efforts to coax the whale into deeper water, including the use of coast guard and fire boats to create large waves.
It finally passed through the man-made canal early Friday, and rescuers lost track of it until it was found the next day further east of the coastal town of Wismar in the state of Mecklenburg-Pomerania.
Greenpeace confirmed on Saturday that the mammal was stranded again.
A spokesperson for the Mecklenburg-Pomeranian environment ministry told the DPA news agency: “The whale was spotted again in Wismar Bay at noon today after managing to escape its predicament.
Thilo Maack, a marine biologist from Greenpeace, told DPA there were no plans to launch another rescue operation on Saturday.
“We want to give the whale a chance to free itself,” he said.
State Environment Minister Till Backhaus said if the animal had not managed to swim freely by then, experts would try to “gently nudge” the whale on Sunday and “steer it into deeper water.”
Backhaus noted that there was a deeper channel near the whale, which could have allowed the whale to free itself.
“The whale is still showing signs of trying to swim away,” Maack said after observing the stranded animal from a boat early Saturday.
“So we hope he will free himself.”
“Now it’s best to leave the whale completely alone.”
It is unclear why the whale swam into the Baltic Sea.
Some experts think the animal may have lost its way when it swam after a school of herring, while another theory is that the whale was probably a male, as males tend to migrate.
The marine mammal cannot survive for long in the Baltic Sea.
According to local media reports, other problems include that the salt concentration in the water was not high enough and that the creature was already suffering from a skin disease.
He will also not be able to find the right type of nutrition he needs.
If he wants to survive, he will have to return to the Atlantic Ocean, a journey of hundreds of kilometers through the waters of Germany and Denmark.
with DPA
