A Whale of a Story!
The Marine Mammal Center and private citizens free trapped humpback whale
For more photos of the rescue, click here.
On Sunday morning, December 11, 2005, The Marine Mammal Center’s Stranding Department received a report of an entangled humpback whale offshore from San Francisco Bay. The report originated from some fishermen who came across the stranded whale and relayed the information to Mick Menigoz, a charter fish captain who also leads whale-watching treks. For years, Mick and his crew have assisted The Center with animal responses and releases offshore. Mick outlined in detail information about the whale, the entanglement and exact location. This information would be critical in saving the 40-to-50 foot long whale.
By mid-morning, The Center’s Director of Veterinary Science, Frances Gulland, was leading the charge with a plan of action to rescue the whale. Joining her were two volunteers with The Center’s water rescue team -- Jim Smith and Kathi Koontz. All were trained for whale disentanglements and ready to assist. In addition, Mick Menigoz donated his boat (the Superfish) and crew to go out on the mission and he brought along several skilled rescue divers -- private citizens who volunteered to help in any way they could. The team was off to find the whale by 1pm.
The whale, an adult female humpback, was located approximately 18 miles offshore of San Francisco, just shy of the Farallon Islands. Between the first call and arrival of the disentanglement team, the whale drifted almost 1/2 mile, but was not actively swimming. The whale was ensnared in at least four commercial crab pots, with buoys attached. The divers estimated approximately 20 to 30 individual commercial nylon lines were entangling her. One diver described her as being “hogtied” as the lines from her tale and flippers were tangled beneath trapping the whale in a hunched position. The entanglements were around the tail (wrapped around at least four times), over the back, around the left front flipper and in the mouth.
Whale disentanglement is a very difficult and hazardous activity. For safety reasons, most disentanglement attempts are executed from boats. However, Frances and her team knew more would have to be done in order to free the whale. Without wasting anytime, the divers jumped into the water and began cutting the ropes. By almost 4pm, an hour after the team found the whale, “Lucky the Humpback” as she was named, was safely and successfully disentangled. She circled in the water for about 15 minutes, then swam away free of the debris. One of the divers, James Moskito, told local media of the freed whale’s reaction: “It felt to me like it was thanking us, knowing that it was free and that we had helped it." Moskito says the whale stopped about a foot away from him and playfully nudged him before swimming away.
This is the first successful whale disentanglement that The Center has responded to in its history.
The Center thanks all of its volunteers and staff involved in the successful disentanglement as well as the four experienced master/rescue divers (James Moskito, Jason Russey, Ted Vivian and Tim Young), Geary Barnes, Holly Drouillard, U.S. Coast Guard Petty Officer Jinx, Captain Mick Menigoz, and the fishermen who first located the whale.
For more photos of the disentanglement, click here.
To read the latest news about the rescue, click here.
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