Beach-goers in pursuit of selfies have killed a baby dolphin — again
A baby dolphin has died after a group of beach-goers in Spain surrounded it to take pictures.
Equinac, a Spanish non-profit organization that advocates for marine wildlife, told the Washington Post the creature was stranded on the coast of Mojácar when "curious" onlookers surrounded it, holding and touching it to take pictures.
Some of them may have accidentally covered the dolphin's blowhole, the organization said, leaving it unable to breath.
"Once again we note that the human being is the most irrational species that exists," Equinac wrote on Facebook Aug. 11, the day of the incident
"There are many [who are] incapable of empathy for a living being that is alone, scared, starved, without his mother and terrified. ... All you want to do is to photograph and poke, even if the animal suffers from stress."
Not the first time
The story follows a similar incident in Argentina last year.
In February 2016, As It Happens spoke with Veronica Garcia of wildlife organization Vida Silvestre about a baby dolphin that died after being mauled by beachgoers.
"We saw this picture [and] we wanted to raise awareness and to tell these people to leave the dolphins alone," Garcia told As It Happens host Carol Off at the time.
The Argentina dolphin might have been sick and would probably have died, Garcia said, even if it had not been taken out of the water.
But that doesn't excuse people interfering with a wild animal, she added.
"They should have just called the authorities."
