Lung damage, hunger and disorientation have been cited as the factors that led a pod of 52 short-finned pilot whales to strand earlier this year on Madura Island, Indonesia. 34 necropsies were carried out and the cause of death of the pod’s matriarch was due to lung damage and severe inflammation in her melon – a key organ involved in communication and echolocation which being inflamed most likely disrupted her ability to navigate and subsequently led her and the rest of the pod to wash ashore. Twenty-six of the 34 whales examined were female, dehydration and exhaustion were found to be the cause of death for the rest of the pod. Three males survived the initial stranding and were put back out to sea but all beached again at a different location, two of them died.
The Indonesian fisheries ministry has called for necropsies to be carried out in future stranding incidents to help improve efforts to handle strandings.
