Sightseers have spotted dozens of dead beached pilot whales during a helicopter flight over western Iceland.
The dead whales were photographed last week during the trip over a beach at Longufjorur, which is very secluded. It is inaccessible by car and has little to no visitors. It’s unclear how the mammals became beached.
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Local media said that police in the nearby town of Stykkisholmur have been made aware of the sad discovery.
Helicopter pilot David Schwarzhans took the images. He told the BBC:
“We were flying northbound over the beach and then we saw them. We were circling over it not sure if it was whales, seals or dolphins. We landed and counted about 60 but there must have been more because there were fins sticking out of the sand. It was tragic and when we stood downwind it was smelly. It wasn’t something nice to see and quite shocking since there were so many.”1
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Whale expert and marine biologist Edda Elisabet Magnusdottir told the Iceland Monitor that when such mammals enter shallow waters “most of them have a tendency to become disorientated.”1
She added that pilot whales usually swim in tight groups, which is why so many of them become stranded at once.
About 145 pilot whales were found beached on an island in New Zealand last November. Half of them had died by the time they were discovered, and the remaining were put down because it would have been too difficult to save them.
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