Tsunami dolphins rescued from Thai lagoon
Rescuers freed a humpback dolphin from a small Thai lagoon where the Asian tsunami had dumped it – returning it today to the Andaman Sea in a rare story of survival 10 days after the massive waves crushed tourist resorts in the surrounding Khao Lak area.
The dolphin, spotted Monday half a mile from the beach by a man searching for his missing wife, had become a symbol of hope amid the death and destruction.
But two days of efforts to free it failed, first because the nets were too small, then because trees and other debris on the bottom of the lagoon apparently tore holes in the nets and allowed the dolphin to slip out.
Officials had planned to wait until Saturday to try again, but local fishermen and soldiers showed up with a double net today.
As about 150 people watched, soldiers lined the length of the nets, splashing to herd the dolphin into a corner of the lagoon. It managed to jump the first net, but then was trapped between the two nets.
The soldiers put in on a stretcher and pulled it up the muddy bank and into a pickup truck, where it was laid on an air mattress and driven to the sea.
The rescuers then walked out into the water and released the dolphin, which quickly swam away.
“She’s out!” Edwin Wiek, a Dutchman who is director of the Wildlife Friends of Thailand Rescue Centre, said jubilantly. “I think she’s going to survive.”
The fate of a second, smaller dolphin – believed to be the larger one’s calf - was unclear.
It was not seen during the rescue, and Wiek said a couple of wildlife workers would maintain a vigil for a couple of hours. If it was spotted, a rescue attempt would be mounted on Friday.
Of the dolphin resuced today, Wiek said: “She seemed to be pretty exhausted at the end, so she actually drove herself into the net."
Wiek said the dolphin, which originally was spotted with a shallow wound on her back, suffered some small injuries from the net, so it received an injection of antibiotics, also smeared on the wounds.
The net had caught its fins awkwardly, and the mammal, estimated at 13 to 15 years old, appeared to be crying, he added.
The rescuers then carried the dolphin from the truck, walked out into the water and released it.
“She went off like a rocket,” Wiek said.
Local fishermen also managed to trap and free a dugong – a type of sea mammal - that had been trapped in a lagoon near a navy base in Phang Nga province.
About 500 to 600 Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins are believed to inhabit the seas around Thailand, migrating between the Indian and Pacific oceans.
