More than 40 killer whales beach themselves off Phuket
June 27th, 2008 by The Lost Boy
Yesterday evening, more than 40 killer whales reportedly beached themselves on the small island Koh Racha, off the south coast of Phuket. One of them died apparently. Villagers informed the authorities at about 6 pm last night. (KomChadLuek)
I’ve never heard of such an event occurring around Phuket. Hopefully there will be some pictures online soon. Anyone care to hazard a guess why such a thing might happen?
Addendum: Apparently there were only 11 of them and they were “False Killer Whales”. (Gazette)
Filed under Bizarre .
June 27th, 2008 at 5:46 am
In fact whales beaching themselves around Phulet Island is a relatively common occurance, which has been accelerating over recent years. On avarege twenty or so a year beach themselves, although for obvious reasons this is not necessarily given great media play.
On dissecting some of the whales the Marind Biology Department of the Phuket Aquarium has found that the stomachs of the deceased whales are full of plastic waste materials, plastic bags and other oecanic pollutants Another example of the terribel toll that diregaurd for the ndaman environment is wreaking on marine life. The solution is straight forward.
a) Stop the dumping of plastic pollutants into the Andaman, with a strongly enforeced, no corrupt policing effort.
b) Charge for all plastic bags in all retail outlets, with the derived revenues going into the policing and protection efforts to clean up, and maintain the environmentla health of the Andaman.
c) Public awareness communications campaugns on all major media funded by (b) above and by the government.
Will this happen? Of course not
Will the Andman continue to be polluted in increasing degree…yes
Will more whales beach themselves as a result…Yes
June 27th, 2008 at 9:47 am
Check this link for a video taken last night:
http://thainews.prd.go.th/newsenglish/previewnews2.php?news_id=320
June 27th, 2008 at 9:48 am
False killer whales? Please elaborate. :-D
June 27th, 2008 at 11:00 am
It’s their proper name, strangely. I’d never heard of them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_Killer_Whale
July 15th, 2008 at 2:24 am
I wonder what this test will bring, love joy or a diamond ring?