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Tourists in San Bernardo, Argentina killed a baby dolphin that they pulled out of the water to take selfies with, the Argentinian newspaper La Capital reported on Friday. The dolphin was reportedly dragged out of the water and left for dead after the tourists were done with shooting pictures. An eyewitness told La Capital that the atrocity was committed by a larger group of tourists who surrounded the dolphin and didn’t seem concerned for the animal’s well-being while taking photos. Following their selfie session, the dolphin was left stranded and was reportedly still breathing when the perpetrators told the eyewitness that the animal was already dead and left the scene. Argentinian authorities have yet to comment on the report from La Capital.
The incident occurred earlier this month and a video depicting it was posted by C5N last Monday and can be seen below. Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time tourists in Argentina killed a dolphin for completely selfish purposes. A similar incident was recorded in February of 2016 when a tourist pulled a young Franciscana dolphin out of the water in Santa Teresita with the intention to take selfies with it. That rare animal also didn’t survive its encounter with humanity. Even though dolphins breathe air just like humans do, these aquatic mammals are extremely sensitive to temperature changes and dragging them out of the water can easily have fatal consequences, as evidenced by these incidents. Furthermore, even if a dolphin doesn’t experience a thermal shock when it gets stranded, it cannot survive outside of the water for a long time because the weight of its body will eventually crush its organs.
There’s currently no information on whether Argentinian authorities are investigating the latest incident in San Bernardo. Currently available information suggests that the baby dolphin in San Bernardo died of dehydration and overheating after being passed around for pictures for too long. This latest tragedy is yet another reminder for humanity to be responsible towards nature but it remains to be seen whether authorities will use this incident to set a precedent for heavily sanctioning all people who believe their selfies are more important than animal lives.