Humpback shares a ‘emotional moment’ with rescuers
A nine-metre humpback whale was in no apparent hurry to swim away from his rescuers. Instead the marine mammal‚ after being disentangled from nine wraps of rope‚ “remained there for almost 20 minutes seemingly staring at his rescuers”. “Once all rope and the flotation buoy was removed‚ in a most incredible reaction from the animal‚ the whale swam right up to alongside the sea rescue craft‚ almost hugging the rescue boat and he gently placed his head on the gunnel of the sea rescue craft‚” South African Whale Disentanglement Network’s (SAWDN) Mike Meyer said.“All involved described a surreal and emotional moment shared between the SAWDN volunteer team and this beautiful animal.”They had been activated on Sunday‚ following reports from fishing boats of a whale entangled in rope and flotation buoys in the vicinity of Rocky Banks‚ off-shore of Cape Point.Two National Sea Rescue Institute rescue craft from Simonstown were dispatched carrying SAWDN volunteers and “the whale‚ a sub-adult nine-metre male humpback whale‚ was found about five nautical miles off-shore of Smitswinkel Bay‚ False Bay‚ heading slowly in the direction of Gordons Bay”.SAWDN’s Meyer described what happened next: “…the rescue craft gently approached the entangled whale from behind and the SAWDN team‚ using a grappling hook line‚ gently placed the line‚ attached to the sea rescue craft‚ onto a loop in the entangled rope.“But‚ as the pressure of the sea rescue craft‚ now effectively being towed by the whale‚ increased the whale appeared anxious and inquisitive to the added impediment and thrashed around a bit.“To distract the animal‚ the larger sea rescue craft moved up to head the whale off and this manoeuvre allowed the SAWDN team to begin cutting at nine wraps of rope that entangled the whale.“All of the rope and the flotation buoy was cut‚ removed and recovered despite some of the specialised disentanglement equipment getting damaged in the operation.”It was at that point the the humpback swam right up and placed his head on the gunnel of the craft‚ and stayed there for almost 20 minutes.“The whale then swam off.”..
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