July 11, 2019 — A North Atlantic right whale rescue mission has failed in its first attempt because of how difficult it is to track the endangered animals.
On Tuesday, the Campobello Whale Rescue Team headed out into the Gulf of St. Lawrence to try to locate and disentangle one of the three entangled North Atlantic right whales spotted in recent weeks.
Philip Hamilton, research scientist with the New England Aquarium, said the rescue team lost track of the whale because the plane that was monitoring it needed to refuel and had to go back to dry land.
“They didn’t have aerial support to help relocate the whale,” he said.