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It’s been more than four months since Marineland, a marine park in southern France, announced its closure, but two killer whales and a dozen dolphins are still stranded there.<\/p>\n
TideBreakers, an animal advocacy group, recently released distressing aerial footage of orcas – Wikie, 23, and her son\u00a0Keijo, 11 – swimming aimlessly in the abandoned Marineland Antibes near Cannes, France.<\/p>\n
Activists rushed\u00a0to relocate the abandoned creatures after they were left in what they described as “dangerous” and “despairing” conditions, The Standard reported.<\/p>\n
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“The mother and son are still trapped there, waiting for their fate in collapsing tanks,” TideBreakers wrote, sharing the video on May 11.<\/p>\n
\nApproximately 45 kilometres west of Monaco on the French Riviera’s southern coastal town of Antibes, the park houses 12 abandoned dolphins in the algae-infested, deteriorating tanks.<\/p>\n
According to Marketa Schusterova, co-founder of TideBreakers, the emergency in Marineland Antibes needs to be addressed globally.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are the last two remaining orcas in France in captivity and should be moved quickly,\u201d Schusterova said, South West News Service reported.<\/p>\n
He added that the orcas must be taken out of conditions that endanger their health and well-being. Wikie and Keijo would not be able to survive in the wild because they were both born in confinement, he said.<\/p>\n
Marineland Antibes shut down on January 5 per the French 2021 law, which prohibited performances involving cetaceans, like dolphins and whales, to entertain the public. The two orcas and 12 dolphins were trapped in their kennels.<\/p>\n
Following the shutdown, the park administration has been frantically trying to locate the creatures, particularly the killer whales.<\/p>\n
Although it is no longer a zoo, the management of the facility is still responsible for the animals’ welfare, and a small team is in charge of keeping them alive until they are placed in a new home.<\/p>\n
Despite the dire situation, French officials have rejected alternative proposals, such as a marine zoo in Japan, and have not yet found a suitable location for the orcas in Europe.<\/p>\n
A plea to move the whales to a sanctuary in Tenerife, Spain, was turned down because the facility currently houses four orcas, including a newborn, BBC<\/a> reported.<\/p>\n After rejecting a zoo in Japan, the Whale Sanctuary Project (WSP) in Nova Scotia is a possible destination for the mother-son duo.<\/p>\n For now, a skeleton staff is feeding them, but critics caution that this provides little cerebral enrichment\u2014an essential component for highly intelligent animals like orcas.<\/p>\n
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