Can you see the stranding?
Hopes high tide will help save surviving whales after mass stranding
More than 400 pilot whales have stranded at Farewell Spit in Golden Bay.
DOC Golden Bay operations manager Andrew Lamason said latest reports were that an estimated 70 per cent of the 416 whales had died overnight.
The focus was now on keeping the remaining whales alive and trying to move them to deeper water around the high tide at 10.30am.
It is the third-largest stranding on record. A thousand whales stranded on the Chathams in 1918.
Lamason urgently called for volunteers this morning to help rescue the whales stranded about one kilometre from the base, on the inside of Farewell Spit. Hundreds had heeded the call, arriving in cars and buses to help the surviving whales.
Lamason said it was essential that rescuers had a wet suit and could look after themselves for the day with food and water.
The pod of whales were first spotted swimming close to shore by a DOC ranger in the area late last night. At first light this morning the mass stranding was confirmed.
He asked rubber neckers to stay away from the site. ‘‘We want to be in the business of saving whales, not people.’’
If rescuers could car pool that would also help because of the narrow access road to the Triangle Flat car park at the base of the spit.
Project Jonah has medics and other volunteers at the site. The long, curving spit is a prime site for whale strandings.
The atmosphere at the scene was described as emotional and subdued. Volunteers tasked with trying to save the remaining whales are tackling the job with determination and urgency.
The whales are ‘‘thrashing around’’ and volunteers had to be careful. Send your newstips, photos and video to newstips@stuff.co.nz
The whales are spread out over a huge distance about 300 metres out to sea and the scale of the stranding is overwhelming.
The Golden Bay community has responded to the plea for volunteers with hundreds turning up to try and save the mammals.
Volunteers were asked to work in groups to try and save the remaining whales, and as the tide came in they were trying to get the whales’ blow holes and faces further under water until high tide. At the base of the Spit trucks and diggers are waiting to move in to help move and bury the dead animals.
Farewell Spit Eco Tours manager Paddy Gillooly, who was helping with the rescue, said conditions were working in their favour.
‘‘Now that the tide has come around, the live ones are starting to move,’’ Gillooly said.
‘‘Everyone is working hard to refloat the whales.’’