Penguins in peril that melted our hearts
(and ) even made Attenborough change his mind about coming to the rescue
It was the heartbreaking scene which left millions of tv viewers in tears.
and the images of a penguin chick shivering in the bitter cold after being abandoned by its mother in an icy ravine led the crew of david attenborough’s dynasties to break their cardinal rule of letting nature run its course.
the chick was one of a group of emperor penguins which had been blown into the ravine during a fierce storm in antarctica’s atka Bay and become trapped by its steep slippery walls.
In order to save her own life, the mother had to abandon the chick and scramble up the ice to the rest of the colony. In distressing images, the chick was then seen trying to follow, before tumbling back down to the ravine floor.
at the end of sunday night’s episode on BBc1 the producers revealed they had made the ‘unanimous’ decision to rescue the penguins by digging steps in the ice for them to climb up.
It went against commonly-observed rules among wildlife filmmakers not to intervene in nature, no matter how emotional the circumstances.
sir david himself has spoken out on the subject, saying that ‘tragedy is part of life’.
speaking at the launch of dynasties last month he said in most cases animals would die anyway, adding: ‘all you’re doing is prolonging the death. so you make things infinitely worse.’
But the show’s executive producer backed the crew’s decision to rescue the penguins – and revealed sir david did too.
Mike Gunton said: ‘I was speaking to david about it yesterday and he said he would have done the same too.
‘we have a rule that interfering is a very dangerous thing to do. But these penguins were going to die through a freak act of nature if nothing happened.
‘how would this conversation be going if you said you saw them there and did nothing? I think you have to do it.’
the film crew were shown digging the steps in the ice in the ‘making of’ section at the end of the episode. some were in tears, with one saying: ‘I know it’s natural, but it’s b ***** hard to watch.’ as they packed up to leave, the penguins started to use the ramp to climb to safety.
director will Lawson said: ‘we opted to intervene passively. once we’d dug that little ramp, which took very little time, we left it to the birds. we were elated when they decided to use it.
‘there’s no rule book in those situations. I’m sure some people will have an opinion in the other direction but in my heart of hearts I think we made the right decision.’
the actions of the crew were praised by many on twitter, with one calling it a ‘special moment in wildlife filming’ and another saying: ‘My heart has just shattered into a million tiny pieces.’
In 2013 sir david was forced to defend his decision to let an elephant calf die of thirst while he was filming his africa series.
he said at the time: ‘of course you see really tough things, but there’s nothing you can do about them. If you’re a film cameraman you are trained to be the observer, a non-participant. that’s very important.’
sir david has broken the nonintervention rule before, in 2016, with the presenter and his team on Blue Planet II saving a group of sea turtles which had become disoriented by bright street lights after hatching on a beach in Barbados and started heading inland towards busy roads.
‘Elated when they used it’