Research into Blue Whale distribution around one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes and analysing their fatal collisions with ships has led scientists to offer a simple solution to the deadly threat.
Heavy ship traffic crossing the Indian Ocean passes close to the southern coast of Sri Lanka, bringing it into waters also occupied by the endangered Blue Whale, the largest animal on the planet.
Survey work coordinated by the University of Ruhuna in Sri Lanka, local whale watch operator Raja and the Whales, International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), Biosphere Foundation and Wildlife Trust of India (WTI) in 2014 and 2015, was carried out with the aim of finding ways to address Blue Whale deaths in the ship strike hotspot off the coast of Mirissa.
A paper on the findings, Distribution patterns of blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus) and shipping off southern Sri Lanka, was recently accepted for publication in Regional Studies in Marine Science.
Eleven Blue Whales are known to have been killed by ships between January 2010 and April 2012 but the true number of ship strike-related deaths is likely to be much higher as for part of the year the current and winds are offshore, meaning additional whales could have been killed but their carcasses not found.
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