Dolphin dies after mid-air collision during Sea World trick

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/US/04/28/dolphin.death/?imw=Y&iref=mpstoryemail

Dolphin dies after collision during Sea World trick


Decrease font Decrease font


(CNN) -- A 30-year-old dolphin at Sea World has died after colliding with another dolphin while performing aerial tricks, the Orlando, Florida, amusement park said Monday.

The incident occurred about 4:30 p.m. Saturday at the Discovery Cove area of the park, according to a statement by Sea World spokeswoman Becca Bides.

The animals were in the center of the lagoon and not near guests, she said.

The dolphin who died was named Sharky. The other dolphin, Tyler, is being watched by veterinarians but appears to be fine, Bides said.

"This is an unfortunate, random incident," Bides said in a written statement.

"While it is not unusual to have two animals performing aerial behaviors at the same time, we are reviewing the situation to ensure even such a random incident does not occur again."

You can't. Strange article. It is written up like a police report.

There was an incident in 1989 where one orca was doing an aerial stunt and a trainer was riding another orca across the pool. Well, orca #1 landed on orca #2, trainer was the now-rather-tenderized meat in the dolphin sandwich. Neither orca was hurt in that case, but it took a lot of surgery to put the human back together- his spine was crushed, his leg was broken, his pelvis was a mess and his midsection was full of sea water, bacteria and whale shit because the tear ruptured his anus.

That was almost two decades ago, so they certainly knew that having multiple dolphins in a confined space where their primary sense doesn't work (sonar echoes too much to be effective in an oversized swimming pool, so these captive dolphin routines are a bit like having a whole team of blind gymnasts doing their floor routines at once in the same space) was potentially dangerous and that collisions could happen during aerial stunts.

for a bunch of selfish humans.

not from rescue of distressed wild animals.

should be a felony.

Last I knew mine were pretty damn domesticated. :eyes:

I do think it would help if we left some space for what's left of the wild animals to roam. We keep crowding out their habitat for our strip malls and sports stadiums.

We encroach on their territory. If they adapt and make the mistake of showing up in the daylight, someone yells "Save the children!" and out come the guns to kill the wild animal because now that wild aninal is encroaching on our territory. Kinda like the Indians of old, second verse.

They're rather pampered. I don't think they'd like being in the wild. Except for Muffin (don't let the name fool you), maybe. She'd tear your ass UP.

Bake

capture wild dophins and whales for use in theme parks.

I know this because at one time I worked in the world's original ocean theme park. It was set up as marine movie studio, but was open to visitors.

That original theme park was fought for the Marine Mammal Protection Act. All of the dolphins that came to the theme park since then came the natural way, thorugh birth.

While I did not work with the dolphins, I was lucky enough to be able to spend time with them. They were playful and interacted quite nicely with humans. There were always basketballs in their tanks and they would play catch tirelessly with the humans. It was great fun and those dolphins made the most of it. They would grab great mouthfuls of water with the ball and throw the water at the human along with the ball. Then they dance on the water and "dolphin laugh" at us as we shook off the water.

One dolphin would spray water in a stream at anyone who walked past her tank... She taught her daughter to do the same.

I don't know how things are at Sea World, but I would hope that Sea World is similar to the place where I worked. The dolphin were loved very much, and I believe the dolphins loved at least some of the people as much.

Seriously. I think it's grand if you believe that. Ignorant, but grand.

and probably have changed. Some for the better and some for the unspeakable. And in that, I'm not talking about marine parks.

I'm talking about just about everything in this country.

I don't know what is happening in marine parks other than the one I worked at. And I don't know what is happening now in the one I worked at 30 years ago.

But I do know that it would be incredibly difficult to release into the wild dolphins who have lived in marine parks or aquariums for years. And maybe impossible to release dolphins born in marine park/aquariums into the wild.

Unless, of course, you don't care what happens to them after they are released.

If you are advocating that dolphins in marine parks be prevented from reproducing and simply not allowing any more dolphins in marine parks/aquariums, thus ending the parks by attrition, then perhaps you might have a possible solution. (But that also brings in the "quality of life" issue.)

But you'd better get a nonprofit foundation set up to take over care for the dolphins that will be without care when the parks/aquariums close down and the dolphins that will be abandoned.

:(

OK. Not cool. Sorry.

There used to be data that showed that they died young a lot of the time, but the feds stopped collecting any data on marine mammal deaths in captivity. Call me crazy, but that's a baaaaaad sign- if they had a good record of caring for captive animals you know they'd be pointing to it every chance they got.

Also, let's not lose fact of where the dolphins come from- because captivity kills them off faster than more can be bred in captivity, supporting the captive dolphin industry supports "dolphin drives" where a few attractive and young specimens are taken by aquarium representatives, and the rest of the dolphin pod are killed and eaten.

This quote is from a web page which is not friendly to dolphin captures.



http://sailhawaii.com/captivedolphins.htm

What happens to old animals?

Dolphins in captivity do not retire after a certain age or after a certain number of years of performing for the public. In those facilities that have adequate resources, dolphins that fall ill or show signs of distress are isolated while veterinarians identify and treat the problem. Some dolphins respond to treatment and recover only to be forced to perform again. Others succumb to their illness.

Nobody really knows the exact average lifespan of captive dolphins and records of births and deaths maintained by the industry are only made available to the public on a voluntary basis. In the case of wild-caught dolphins, there is no accurate method to tell the age of the animal and therefore the age at the time of death can only be estimated or remains unknown.

There has been much debate about the longevity of captive dolphins compared with that of dolphins in the wild. Regardless of whether it can yet be scientifically determined that life spans differ between captive and wild animals, it is a fact that seemingly healthy and normal captive cetaceans die at relatively early ages on a regular basis, usually with little or no warning and due to causes very different from their wild counterparts. In short, very few captive animals live to an old age and even if they do, they perform until they are unable to.

A dolphin's life span cannot be used as a measurement for the animal's well being. The captivity issue is not about science or the number of years an animal lives; it's about quality of life. And in this regard, the captive environment does not provide for a dolphin's needs.

http://www.wspa-usa.org/pages/2220_dolphins_in_captivity_faqs.cfm#old

I would add that a long life in captivity, and that's a fairly unusual thing, does not equal a good life. Dolphins in the wild have social interactions with many other dolphins, range over huge areas, hunt quite a few different kinds of prey, and engage in what can only be described as play. Captive dolphins stay in what are essentially overgrown swimming pools, in chlorinated pool water that harms their skin, making them prone to bacterial infections (a frequent cause of death, back when they had to report the deaths to the feds) where their sonar is worthless because of echoes off the concrete pool walls, where they interact more with humans than with other dolphins, and where their play behaviors are modified, structured and taught on command for human amusement.

A long life of that would be no favor at all.

That Oldest Living Dolphin Born In Captivity retired by her own wish about fifteen to twenty years ago. I don't know if she still does, but every now and then after she retired, she would indicate that she wanted to do a show and she was allowed to do so.

If a dolphin doesn't want to perform, he or she will not perform. It doesn't happen often because they seem to enjoy it.

Have you ever worked with dolphins or in a ocean theme park? Do you have information to back up your pov?

If you are suggesting that the performing dolphins who have been in captivity for years or who were born in theme tanks should be set free, then you need to understand that it isn't that simple.

David and Melba Caldwell, pioneers in the science of dolphin language/communication related an event in one of their books about some well-meaning person who really didn't understand anything about dolphins giving a live fish to a dolphin who had been in the park for several years to eat.

The dolphin, used to being hand fed with dead fish, took the live fish which started flappiing around in the dolphin's mouth. The dolphin was traumatized. It took several days for the dolphin to trust the feeders enough to be hand fed again.

Freeing dolphins who were born in the wild would be very difficult. Freeing dolphins who were born in theme parks and lived in theme parks all of their lives might not be possible.

This whole argument about dolphins in sea parks needing to be set free is a lot like a group that has yearly protests against carriage horses being used to pull carriages. They claim that it is cruel and inhumane to hitch the horses up to carriages and expect them to pull carriages... I'm not sure what they think will happen to the horses if they don't pull the carriages, but it would proabably be the glue factory.

What would happen to the dolphins if they were set free? They'd probably starve.

BTW, there was a case (I'm not sure, but I think it was Hurricane Andrew, 1992) where a hurricane badly damaged an ocean theme park and the dolphins were washed out to sea. Those dolphins stayed close to the ocean park until they were rescued by park personnel. The dolphins wanted to go back to the park. It took about three weeks to get them all back to the park. The ones that were out the longest were not in the best condition.

Here's some more information about who they are and what they do: http://www.wspa-usa.org/pages/12_about_us.cfm I know they work closely with experts on dolphins generally and specifically on captive dolphins, and do really good work, probably the best of any animal advocacy organization, on dolphin issues. A lot of the footage from Taji and other dolphin drive fisheries comes from them, and they've been successful in getting some of those fisheries shut down.

As for whether I've worked at a marine park? Of course not. I'm not supportive of animal exploitation, I'm certainly not about to make a buck off of it, and in any case the closest local marine park is a fucking hellhole. One particular problem is that they put in theme park rides to increase profitability, and a lot of the land animals have grown sick or died due to the noise increasing their stress- it's really a horrible place for animals. Since it's owned by a city that's in bankruptcy (Vallejo, CA) god alone knows what else those poor animals are going to go through to squeeze a few more pennies out of them, or who they'll wind up selling them to. Then again, the place has a long history of putting profit above animals (they had sharks die at their old location back in the seventies because they wouldn't spring a few bucks to shade their enclosure from the sun) and honestly, I haven't seen any evidence that such behavior is out of the ordinary for marine parks, and a good deal of evidence that it is.

Your stories about how animals supposedly like marine park living absolutely horrify me, because to me they would indicate not that the animals like captivity, but after being bred in a swimming pool or stolen from their mothers at an early age, they don't know the basics of being a dolphin- getting by in the ocean, establishing their place in a pod or even catching a live fish! This doesn't mean that they enjoy captive living, only that their training has been focused more on getting them to perform tricks than on teaching them the rudiments of their natural behavior, which, as mammals, they really ought to have learned from their mothers and others in their pods, out in the ocean where they belong. Socialization for a dolphin shouldn't mean an asshat in a wet suit with a beach ball, it's supposed to mean a whole familial group, in the ocean, hunting, rearing young, roaming great distances, responding to an enormous variety of natural cues. Halfassed enrichment, however well intentioned, is not a life. These are incredibly intelligent animals- they need the stimulation only their real environment can provide. They frequently manifest physical symptoms (dorsal droop in orcas, for example) and behaviors (repetitive behaviors indicative of stress, aggression toward trainers) that indicate they are not thriving animals.

Domestication isn't the sweet life for dolphins, these animals are raised in sensory deprivation (quite literally, since their sonar is rendered ineffective in concrete-lined pools) and trained to be anything but what nature intends them to be, an act of sickening selfishness and cruelty.

Cuz God bless, put a monkey on stage and they'll garner an opinion and post it. Then, they'll beat their idiot chests in support of the stupidity they've posted.

Cue "dunno shit about animals response".

Now, go!

It is time.

Building a beach house is an arduous task and being able to see them working shoals of fish near the beach makes it all worthwhile. Horrible accident, I have seen the seaworld show several times, my grandmother got to pet Shamu when she came down for a visit.

I have gone on whale/dolphin watching trips. HIGHLY recommend to anyone who has access to the coast (all of mine were out of California).

It is really amazing seeing them in their NATURAL environment.

Just sad.

I think they are pretty good to the animals at Sea World. I'm sure the trainers are devastated.

As much as I love being able to see these magnificent creatures up close, they do NOT belong in tanks.

odd phrase for a story about DOLPHINS, even if it is technically true

poor critter.

:shrug:

The oldest living dolphin born in captivity turned fifty-five this past February.

I wonder if they stress the animals doing these shows.

http://www.wspa-usa.org/pages/2220_dolphins_in_captivity_faqs.cfm#old

What happens to old animals?

Dolphins in captivity do not retire after a certain age or after a certain number of years of performing for the public. In those facilities that have adequate resources, dolphins that fall ill or show signs of distress are isolated while veterinarians identify and treat the problem. Some dolphins respond to treatment and recover only to be forced to perform again. Others succumb to their illness.

Nobody really knows the exact average lifespan of captive dolphins and records of births and deaths maintained by the industry are only made available to the public on a voluntary basis. In the case of wild-caught dolphins, there is no accurate method to tell the age of the animal and therefore the age at the time of death can only be estimated or remains unknown.

There has been much debate about the longevity of captive dolphins compared with that of dolphins in the wild. Regardless of whether it can yet be scientifically determined that life spans differ between captive and wild animals, it is a fact that seemingly healthy and normal captive cetaceans die at relatively early ages on a regular basis, usually with little or no warning and due to causes very different from their wild counterparts. In short, very few captive animals live to an old age and even if they do, they perform until they are unable to.

A dolphin's life span cannot be used as a measurement for the animal's well being. The captivity issue is not about science or the number of years an animal lives; it's about quality of life. And in this regard, the captive environment does not provide for a dolphin's needs.

paramount. The park was invested in the welfare of the dolphins. That came first.

The dolphin that is now 55 years old retired about fifteen to twenty years ago. She occasionally let it be known after her retirement that she would like to perform in a show, but the park never expected or allowed her to do a full day a shows.

I don't know how Sea World works. So I cannot comment on their policies. But the dolphins were well cared for and loved in the park where I worked. The dolphins made attachements with the humans in the park.

I'm not sure how a dolphin could be forced to perform if it didn't want to. (The "tricks" that they perform are very much like what they do naturally in the wild.) But food is not withheld from them, they are never physically punished. The worst "punishment" doled out to the dolphins was for the trainers to turn their backs on the dolphin.

after the park changed hands twice, there were problems when a small group of investors bought the place and stripped it of everything they could.

The future of the park was seriously black before a nonprofit foundation was established, in part by a large University, to reestablish high standards.

I have not been back in 11 years, but there have been no negative stories coming out of that park since the foundation took over.

Do not try that at home.

it's tragic for the dolphins. So sad. I also think it would be horrifying for the children (and adults) in the audience.