Video 2 - 8 Pilot whales killed in Faroe Islands Bloodsport - August 19, 2023

The Faroese pride themselves on their seafaring abilities and their connection to the ocean that surrounds them. Today is national Sailors’ Day.
But instead of being proud, the botched tagging attempt and subsequent grindadrap should see the Faroese Marine Research Institute (FAMRI) feeling thoroughly ashamed by the catalogue of poor decisions by their staff.
This has resulted in yet another unprofessional tagging gone wrong: the tagging should not have been considered due to weather (gusting 62kph!) and wind direction, the team took too long to arrive and greater efforts should have been made to allow time for the animals to recover and be driven out. The weather made killing the animals very difficult, resulting in multiple wounds both from rocks and false starts with the knife (see photos).

Timeline below
10:22 News breaks of what is described as a mixed pod of Atlantic white-sided dolphins and pilot whale (also a dolphin species) being reported to the MRI to see if they were interested in tagging. Meantime the pod is kept in the fjord.
11:20 CPWF UK volunteers arrive on site, finding no sign of Atlantic white-sided dolphins
12:18 Tagging team finally arrives on site and makes the decision to proceed with tagging despite difficult weather conditions
12:41 The decision is made to abandon the tagging due to weather and drive them back out. The eight pilot whales have already been moved into very shallow water.
13:01 The pod is disorientated, weakened and now in water so shallow that stranding is a strong possibility. A boat attempts to get between the pilot whales and the shoreline but swiftly abandons efforts.
13:24 Animals start to strand on the rocks, unable to keep themselves upright
13:30 Decision taken to kill the animals. Due to the small number of folk on-hand to kill the pod, this took over 10 minutes – 9 and a half of which is shown on our livestreams.
Tagging of an animal should only ever be undertaken by trained professional (much of the tagging work is undertaken my community members overseen by scientists) and should only be undertaken when there is a clear scientific need. Yet time and again we see the decision being taken to tag simply because animals are there and the pod is not big enough to bother calling a grind.
Today that resulted in more unnecessary deaths.

Filmed by team Captain Paul Watson Foundation UK
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CaptainPaulWatsonFoundationUK
Website: https://cpwf.uk/

#pilotwhales #grind #tagging #dolphinspotting #OpBloodyFjords #cpwfuk #visitfaroeislands