'Dolphins can bring out the worst in people'

SIMON and Bev Drayton were involved in a training exercise on Scarborough beach last February when the crowds began to gather. The Draytons, North Yorkshire members of the British Divers Marine Life Rescue (BDMLR) charity, had blown up a life-size inflatable whale to use in demonstrations. The crowds thought the whale was real.

"We had people crying on the beach, sitting in front of it because they thought it was a real one we were trying to help," recalls Simon. "And that was just a training exercise."

Sea mammals, and in particular dolphins, bring out the best in people and the worst, chips in BDMLR consultant Doug Cartlidge. Few people know this as much as Doug.

The faces of divers from the BDMLR have been beamed across the world recently. They were captured desperately trying to save the northern bottlenose whale which died after it found its way up the Thames to central London. Few could have imagined how the rescue attempt would go on to dominate the news agenda and cause thousands of people to turn up daily to pray and watch its progress.

Simon, Bev and Doug can receive emergency calls at any time of the day or night to help the stricken mammals. The BDMLR trains more than 400 Marine Mammal Medics a year who are scattered across the country. They are all volunteers and many have full-time jobs.

The charity was formed in 1988 by a few like-minded divers who got together in response to a huge increase in the number of harbour seals dying in East Anglia.

Simon, 36, - who has been a Humber coastguard for 20 years - and Bev, 40, who live in Scarborough, are area coordinators for the organisation.

"We decide how many people need to go based on what type of incident it is," says Bev. "A lot of the time with seals we can get a call and there'll be nothing wrong with it, it'll just be sunbathing. They'll be lying on their side, flipper up in the air, and someone will come along and think it's not normal. But we would rather go out 100 per cent of the time because there may be a time the seal could be injured."

The types of mammals commonly found off the British Isles include the grey seal and common or harbour seal; the harbour porpoise and bottlenose dolphin. The reasons why they find themselves in need of rescue varies.

On a general level, there is growing evidence that sea mammals around the world are being affected by Low Frequency Active Sonar, a sophisticated system of underwater speakers and microphones used on warships to detect "enemy" submarines at long distance. It works by blasting immense, powerful sounds into the ocean and detecting the echoes.

Says Doug, 56, of Scarborough: "It blows the ear drums of whales and dolphins and they lose their balance which means they can't submerge and then they can't feed. It brings them to the surface and then they die at sea or some of them beach themselves."

The whale in the Thames had simply taken a wrong turning. Dolphins and whales get all their water from the food they eat and, through a lack of food, it began to dehydrate.

Another problem whales face - and what the divers can do nothing about - is the tide. If a whale comes to shore on a high tide it can be hours before the tide is in a position to take the mammal back out to sea again. If it becomes stranded, the sheer bulk of it can end up crushing its own internal organs.

"It lives in a weightless environment so if it's on the beach then all the weight is on its vital organs," says Doug.

There are also injuries, starvation and viruses. Simon and Bev became involved with BDMLR when they met Doug three years ago when a virus was killing thousands of seals. Most of the injured seals they rescue are taken to the Sea Life Centre in Scarborough before being released, never singularly, to colonies off the coast. If a mammal washes up dead they are taken to the Natural History Museum in London for a post mortem.

When Marra the dolphin became trapped in Maryport harbour last month it attracted crowds of around 2,000 every weekend. It is believed the bottlenose dolphin followed a small fishing boat into the marina, but was too scared to travel over the harbour gate to swim free.

Eventually, members of the BDMLR were called in. Doug was among them and knew as soon as he saw the mammal's skin that it was in trouble. Because there was more fresh water in the marina than the sea, the low salinity was causing a bleaching effect, turning Marra's skin from its usual dark grey to a lighter grey. There were also other reasons to get the dolphin out.

"It was a small minority, but at night there were people throwing bottles and cans at it," says Doug. "You see what I mean when I say dolphins can bring out the worst in people."

Initially, the divers tried to lure Marra out, but he appeared too afraid to swim over the gate. Other attempts included using an underwater bubble curtain to chase the dolphin over the gate, but he escaped after being more frightened of the gate than the curtain. In the meantime, not everyone wanted Marra to leave.

"The problem is the dolphin was bringing in a lot of tourists who were spending a lot of money in the local businesses," says Doug. "We explained to them that if it stayed there for much longer we would have to get a vet to euthanise it. We ended up getting death threats and threats of physical violence from some of the local people who thought we were going to kill it.

"People would come up to you and say 'if you kill that dolphin you won't leave this f***ing town alive'. The director of British Divers had two threats within an hour of arriving. Others screamed abuse and said 'you're the b****ards who killed that whale in the Thames'."

The Marra incident was not a one-off either. Doug recalls coming under similar fire from locals in Weymouth who wanted to keep their friendly dolphin.

"What is common with the friendly dolphin is that we always get people who put emotion before animal welfare, whereas we put experience before emotion," says Doug. "If we believe an animal can't be saved then we euthanise."

Eventually, the marina at Cumbria was drained, leaving the divers standing knee deep in mud. The conditions were icy cold.

"You couldn't feel your hands," recalls Doug. "But we left more air in our suits which acted as a buoyancy." The rescuers used a capture net and a 30 tonne crane donated by a local business to hoist Marra into the lifeboat.

Marra was kept cool and was taken about two miles out to sea and put over the side of the boat. Being a member of the BDMLR team may be a thankless task at times, but when a rescue goes well, it reminds them why they turn out in the middle of the night and at weekends in all weathers. On this occasion, it almost seemed as if Marra was thanking them.

"All of a sudden he came up in front of the boat and came out of the water in an arc," says Doug. "He was so relaxed. Steven Spielberg couldn't have done it any better. We had two life boat crews with us and every single person had tears in their eyes."

Not all the rescue attempts turn out so well, however, as the whale in the Thames proved. Sometimes the vets have to put the mammals out of their misery.

"It's devastating," says Bev. "There's no other word for it. But we know that we've done everything we possibly can to save the animal. We do it basically because we want to make a difference, and you know that you can make a difference."

* To find out more about the British Divers Marine Life Rescue group log onto www.bdmlr.org.uk. Volunteers who want to train as medics do not have to be divers.