Wildlife

'Unprecedented' Number of Dead Whales Have Washed Up in Scotland and Ireland

A total of 80 deep-water whales have been found dead on the Atlantic coasts of Scotland and Ireland since early August — more than 10 times the usual number over that time in previous years.

Marine mammal scientists say the presence of the washed-up whales suggests an "unusual mortality event," or UME, that could have killed up to 1,000 Cuvier'sbeaked whales in the North Atlantic Ocean in recent months.

The cause of the whale deaths is unknown, but scientists fear they may be the result of warships using active sonar to hunt for enemy submarines, or naval anti-submarine exercises.

Around 26 of the carcasses were Cuvier's beaked whales, a species that lives mainly in the deep ocean, while the rest were either Sowerby's beaked or northern bottlenose whales.

Typically, just two or three dead beaked whales would wash up on the Irish coast each year.

A similar increase in beaked-whale deaths has been reported along the west coast of Scotland.

The sharp increase in the evidence of whale deaths washing up on the coast implied that a much greater number of whales may have been killed in the open ocean.

Scientific research has shown that Cuvier's beaked whales are sensitive to the very loud sounds caused by anti-submarine sonar, which is used by warships hunting for enemy submarines and during naval anti-submarine exercises.

Scientists suspect the loud sonar sounds cause intense pain to beaked whales diving at extreme depths, so that they surface too quickly and die from decompression sickness.