Day Two of Searching for Entangled Blue Whale off Dana Point, California Coast Line

Teams attempting to free a Blue Whale from Dungeness crab trap lines were unsuccessful yesterday, with boats losing sight of the animal around 7 p.m. Monday night. Three vessels searched for the whale, two to three miles off shore, but were unable to locate it.

"The rescue team lost sight of the whale when it became too dark," Gisele Anderson of Captain Dave's disentanglement team said. "The whale is entangled in Dungeness crab traps and lines that are connected to the floats. It was a legal crab trap business and NOAA has identification numbers from the markers."

"Teams were out in force yesterday, spotted by Captain Dave's Whale Watching out of Dana Point," NOAA Spokesperson Michael Milstein said in interview. "The first step today is to try and find the whale again, and we are relying on folks out on the water to be our eyes and help locate it so that we can make another attempt to disentangle the animal."

Yesterday, the disentanglement team from Captain Dave's made several attempts to cut off the ropes but were not able to do so without losing the buoys that were helping them locate the creature.

"We were with the blue whale for nine hours yesterday," Gisele Anderson of Captain Dave's Whale Watching Tours said. "It appears that the whale went through a Dungeness crab trap and got the line caught in its mouth or pectoral flippers."

Reports are that the crab trap is a legal trap. The line has stretched tight across the whale to its fluke, making it hard for the blue whale to swim.

READ: Blue Whale Entangled in Crab Trap Lines

"The crab traps can weigh from 100 to 300 pounds, and that makes it hard for the animal to move," Anderson said. "In the beginning of the day we attached a NOAA telemetry buoy to the whale, and had no choice but to remove it."

Now, the only hope of finding the whale is measured by the crab trap lines that trail the whale, last seen headed south toward San Diego.

"The whale watching boats are out there, looking, " Anderson said. "The whale was last seen heading on a south, south west trajectory. Blue whales can go hundreds if not thousands of miles off shore."

According to Milstein, there were 61 whales reported entangled off of the west coast last year, in 2015. Captain Dave's disentanglement group says the numbers are far greater.

"We estimate that 1,000 dolphins and whales are dying in nets every day. This is the one we saw," Anderson said. "We want to make the most of this opportunity, and that people need to be careful about the choices that they make and there are ways to mitigate this problem."

This report will be updated when more information is released.
Please refresh this page for additional information.

Photos Courtesy Captain Dave's Dolphin and Whale Safari--Photos by Naturalist Craig DeWitt- plus buoy photo, courtesy of passenger Ryan Powers.