https://capecharleswave.com/2013/12/letter-watch-out-for-right-whales/ Your Online Newspaper in Cape Charles, Virginia Fri, 07 Aug 2015 21:55:09 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=4.1 https://capecharleswave.com/2013/12/letter-watch-out-for-right-whales/#comment-27574 Thu, 12 Dec 2013 17:27:43 +0000 http://capecharleswave.com/?p=10429#comment-27574 On December 3, the National Park Service found a pod of short-finned pilot whales stranded on the edge of the Florida Everglades National Park and notified NOAA Fisheries, the lead coordinating agency for responding to marine mammal strandings. Of the 51 whales originally stranded, 22 have died and 29 are still missing. As of 3 p.m. December 9, the Coast Guard conducted a flight search of the lower Keys area and did not see additional whales nearby. A rescue team including NOAA biologists conducted full sampling of the 11 additional deceased whales on Snipe Point to determine the cause of death. The breakdown of animals at Snipe Point was a mix of females and calves. It is difficult to speculate what has happened to the remaining 29 whales, but the search continues. The U.S. Coast Guard continued to search for the stranded pilot whales during the weekend with no luck. Around 1 p.m. Sunday, a recreational fisherman first spotted the whales, and then the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission verified 11 dead pilot whales on Snipe Point in the lower Keys about 6 miles north of Sugar Loaf Key. These were part of the original pod of 51 stranded pilot whales.

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