SEA 



SCIENCE 



A Whale of a Network: 



Rapid Response Team Assists Entangled Humpback 



I 



By Katie Mosher • Photographs by Scott D. Taylor 



. t's just after dawn. Dallas Rose 

 is hoping that sea mullet will fill his gill 

 nets off Cape Lookout. Instead, his 

 catch is something completely unex- 

 pected. 



of a new whale disentanglement network 

 along the North Carolina coast. 



With the Lady Jane crew standing 

 by, the Coast Guard arrives to secure the 

 site. Calls go out to the National Marine 



David Manila, left, and Bill Foster display the disentanglement tools at 

 the N.C. Commercial Fishing Show. 



A young humpback whale gets its 

 tail flukes caught in the netting. The 

 powerful 25-foot whale immediately 

 pulls the 37-foot Lady Jane about a 

 quarter-mile, reminding the captain of a 

 scene from the movie Jaws. 



A veteran of 25 years of commer- 

 cial fishing, Rose gives the whale some 

 slack and reports the incident to the U.S. 

 Coast Guard. His call starts the first test 



Fisheries Service (NMFS), to biologists 

 at Duke University Marine Lab in 

 Beaufort and to national experts in whale 

 disentanglement at the Center for Coastal 

 Studies in Massachusetts, as well as to 

 the N.C. Division of Marine Fisheries. 



A Coast Guard helicopter heads to 

 Oregon Inlet to pick up net tools — 

 hooks and knives — and other special- 

 ized equipment. 



The process is moving like clock- 

 work, thanks to the foresight of commer- 

 cial fisher Bill Foster of Hatteras and the 

 state Fishery Resource Grant Program, which 

 paid for training and whale-specific tools. 



Rescue team members Andrew Read 

 and Andrew Westgate, marine biologists at 

 the Duke lab, were among 30 fishers, 

 scientists and government officials who 

 attended the grant-funded training. 



After consulting with NMFS and 

 David Mattila of the Center for Coastal 

 Studies, who led the training, the rescue 

 team arrives on the Coast Guard's Block 

 Island about 10:45 a.m. 



In the meantime, the Coast Guard 

 helicopter is delivering the equipment, 

 including buoys, radio tags and satellite 

 transmitters, along with the net hooks and 

 knives. 



Although anchored by the net, the 

 whale is not in immediate danger, giving 

 the rescue team a chance to put the 

 previously theoretical procedure into 

 action. As the team finalizes a plan, the 

 Coast Guard keeps onlookers at a 

 distance. 



By 1 p.m., the team is ready to start 

 the disentanglement procedure from a 19- 

 foot boat from the National Oceanic and 

 Atmospheric Administration. Using 

 grappling hooks and delicate knives, they can 

 snip the net between the whale's dives. 



After the fourth dive, the team is able to 

 cut the last piece of netting. The cutting 

 process takes only 40 minutes. The whale 

 immediately takes off, as television cameras 

 catch the escape to freedom. 



26 EARLY SUMMER 1999 



