The world of social media has erupted in outrage after video and photos surfaced of tourists dragging a baby dolphin out of the ocean.
People from around the world are responding with outrage after video and photos surfaced of tourists in Argentina dragging a baby dolphin out of the ocean and then posing for selfies before leaving it to die, the second such incident in the last year in the South American country, according to reports. And many are demanding that authorities take action to bring those responsible to justice.
It stems from an incident on Jan. 22 on a beach in San Bernando. Tourists spotted a baby dolphin swimming in the shallow waters nearby, and waded in to drag it out and onto the beach. As the dolphin slowly died, tourists gathered to touch it and take pictures with it.
The second incident happened last February in the resort of Santa Teresita. A La Plata baby dolphin, a very rare species with just 30,000 believed to exist in the world, was dragged around on the beach for photographs and then left there.
Here is some information on the La Plata Dolphin from Wikipedia.
Taxonomy: The La Plata dolphin is the only species in its genus, and is often placed in its own family, the Pontoporiidae. It was first described by Paul Gervais and Alcide d’Orbigny in 1844 (the species epithet blainvillei commemorates the French zoologist Henri Marie Ducrotay de Blainville). The La Plata dolphin is also widely known as the Franciscana – the Argentine and Uruguayan name that has been adopted internationally. Other common names are the toninha (the Brazilian name) and cachimbo.
Description: The La Plata dolphin has the longest beak (as a proportion of body size) of any cetacean — as much as 15% in older adults. Males grow to 1.6 m (5 ft, 3 in) and females to 1.8 m (5 ft, 10 in). The body is a greyish brown colour, with a lighter underside. The flippers are also very large in comparison with body size and are very broad, but narrow on joining the body, so are almost triangular in shape. The trailing edges are serrated. The crescent-shaped blowhole lies just in front of a crease in the neck, giving the impression that dolphin forever has its head cricked upwards. The dorsal fin has a long base and a rounded tip.
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