mm. m The Battalion
Nation
Wednesday • April 1 .
^-SAfednes
Sea World releases
rescued gray whale
SAN DIEGO (AP) — The Coast Guard
cutter leaned hard, shifting with the weight
pf the 10-ton gray whale as she precarious
ly dangled over the side of the boat.
“Release the whale!” cried the crew officer.
The pulley whirled as the rope rushed
through. J.J. slipped from the canvas cocoon
that was supported by a crane and splashed
into the water Tuesday.
After 14 months at Sea World, where she
was routinely fed, monitored and marveled
at by tourists, J.J. must now survive on her
own. She is the first gray whale raised by hu
mans and her return to the ocean made his
tory for marine science.
“I’ve been waiting for this day since she
came to us," said Sea World veterinarian
Thomas Reidarson. “We have learned so
much and it’s not over.”
1 Just after dawn, J.J. was cradled in a spe
cially-fitted 32-foot stretcher, supported by
20-ton cargo boom. As she was lifted out of
her holding pool at Sea World, she twisted and
snorted as she swung above a flat bed truck.
She was lowered into the animal trans
port carrier, which was padded with foam
rubber for comfort.
Once snug, workers scrambled to keep
her moist with misters and fans, like per
sonal trainers preparing an athlete for a pin-
pacle performance.
The 12-mile ride took less than an hour.
As the largest animal released into the wild,
drivers were cautious not to jostle their
heavy, precious cargo.
The road trip was reminiscence of the
first one J.J. tookjustoverayearago, a jour
ney that saved her life.
r Abandoned by her mother, the days-old
gray whale was found churning in the surf
Jan. 11, 1997, near Marina del Rey.
She was malnourished, dehydrated, and
undersized at 13 feet, 10 inches, weighing
only 1,670 pounds. Her ribs showed through
her skin. Her umbilical cord was still at
tached. She was unconscious.
“She was so limp we could just roll her
over,” said John Heyning, a curator of mam
mals at the Los Angeles County Museum of
Natural History. He was one of the first peo
ple to reach J.J. after she was reported
beached.
Although scientists had never attempted
raising a gray whale from infancy, Sea World
spent $1 million on the effort.
Rushed 120 miles to San Diego for emer
gency care, marine biologists nursed her
with a simulation of mother’s milk — a for
mula of cream, vitamins and pureed fish.
After a few months, she was eating squid.
By Tuesday, she was a healthy 19,000
pounds and 31 feet long. Her daily meals at
Sea World averaged 600 to 800 pounds a day.
“She’s probably bigger and more robust
than her fellow yearlings who just survived
their first winter,” said Jim Sumich, a pro
fessor at San Diego’s Grossmont College
who has studied whales for more than 20
years. “But they may be tougher and
stronger. There’s a lot they learned from
their mothers and their natural environ
ment that J.J. didn’t.”
Once at the U.S. Naval Station Pier at
San Diego Bay, the crew traveling with J.J.
coaxed her onto the 180-foot buoy tender,
the Conifer, hooking her stretcher to a
crane usually used for loading equipment
aboard warships.
The experience was as new to J.J. as it was
for the dozens who helped save her. A Pa
cific gray whale has never before been
raised by humans and released to sea.
J.J. goes home
Mass transit
Here’s how J.J. was
returned to the
iGGt
It has been a remarkable journey for the newborn gray whale
that washed ashore on Venice Beach, Calif., 14 months ago
with her umbilical cord still attached. From the day J.J. arrived
at Sea World, park staff have been preparing her to return to
the ocean. The young whale was returned to the sea Tuesday,
several miles off Point Loma.
PACIFIC
BEACH
1 Vi'
IPORJ
* t
staff an
SEA WORLD
Early Tuesday morning, Sea World
handlers hoisted J.J. from her
enclosure using a 30-foot nylon
stretcher and a 120-ton crane. She
was placed into a specially
designed container, which was
loaded onto a trailer truck.
*#
|
e Mesa
roun.
SURFACE STREETS
With escort in tow, J.J.
was shuttled with care
to the Naval Station,
San Diego, Pier 2,
near National City.
NAVAL STATION \
SAN DIEGO
J.J. was hoisted out of the
container and lowered
onto a 3-foot-thick foam
rubber mattress, located
on the deck of the Conifer
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I PACIFIC OCEAN
The Coast Guard, also with an escort,
moved out of San Diego Bay and released
J.J. into the ocean several miles off Point
Loma. No private boats were allowed
within 500 yards of the Conifer.
lies sv
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