A number of fishermen in Tyre found on Sunday morning a giant dolphin stuck between the rocks at the northern shore of the entrance of Tyre, in front of the headquarters of the Lebanese Electricity Company in the city.
The dolphin, measuring over 2 meters in length, was barely breathing when found and died shortly afterward. The Municipality of Tyre transferred it to the Tyre Coast Nature Reserve.
This is not the first sight of dolphins in Lebanon as they usually pass by our shores every once in a while.
Last month, in August, a striped dolphin from the Stenella Coeruleoalba species washed up on the beach in the Sidon town of Adloun, where it was found injured and floundering on the beach. Despite all efforts to save it, the dolphin didn’t make it.
The Marine Sciences Department of the National Council for Scientific Research launched back then an investigation into the dolphin’s death and it was found that it was killed by “the lack of experience” of those who tried to rescue it.
A few months ago, another dolphin from the Common Bottlenose Dolphin’s species was also found dead, washed up near a residence on the shore of a Southern town.
Moreover, a video of a dolphin near La Marina Dbayeh also went viral on social media a year ago. Dolphins do pass by Lebanon’s shore every once in a while.
It’s worth mentioning that Lebanon’s sea, especially the area near Raouche in Beirut, has been home to Bottlenose dolphins for hundreds of years.
According to the Lebanese Diving Center, “The presence of dolphins is not an emergency on the sea of Lebanon that is located on the eastern edge of the Mediterranean Sea. Lebanon has a distinct marine diversity that exists since a long time ago, and they [the dolphins] are mammal species that don’t present any threat to human beings.”
