Putin’s war on Ukraine blamed for 120,000 dead dolphins in the Black Sea

Explosions, missile launches, and military sonar systems used during the Ukraine war are confusing dolphins in the Black Sea and leaving them unable to hunt, experts have said.Trawlers are finding the animals suffocated and entangled in their nets and cutting off their fins to release them, leaving them to wash ashore with the net marks still visible.Ivan Rusev, head researcher at the Tuzly Lagoons national park in southern Ukraine, told Al Jazeera more than 120,000 dolphins have died this way since Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.A dead dolphin at the Limans Tuzly Lagoons National Nature Park (AFP/Getty)He said many military technologies block their primary survival tool, echolocation, and leave unable to navigate, communicate and hunt.“If a dolphin can’t fish, it loses weight fast,” he said, adding that the animals then switch to drawing on their blubber to fuel themselves. But in an ocean polluted by war, the blubber has already accumulated pollutants from wastewater, agricultural runoff, microplastics and antibiotics.This means their immune systems are compromised and they succumb to lethal respiratory tract infections.The ecosystem of the Black Sea has suffered heavily from the ongoing conflict, as toxic chemicals and fuel leaks into the water from downed drones and sunken submarines. Some fish species such as mullet and bluefish have become scarce despite restrictions on fishing in the region.Scientist Ivan Rusev examines a dead dolphin at the Limans Tuzly Lagoons National Nature Park (AFP/Getty)“With dolphins at the top of the food chain, everything from zooplankton to fish reaches them,” Mr Rusev said.Mr Rusev said the impact is also taking its toll on birds, who feed on fish from the sea. He explained explosions deafen and kill fish and startle the birds migrating between Northern Europe and the Middle East.“And when a bird can’t find enough food, doesn’t have ‘fuel,’ it can’t reach the destination where it winters or nests,” Rusev said. “It will affect the number of certain bird populations for years.”The deaths have horrified Ukrainians, who see the emaciated and damaged dolphins wash up on the Black Sea coast.Tetiana Smolchenko told Al Jazeera she was taking a walk with her eight-year-old son Oleh in the southern city of Odesa in August when the child spotted a decaying dolphin.“I nearly threw up,” the 33-year-old, whose husband serves in the military and whose apartment building has been damaged by a Russian drone twice.“We’re so used to human deaths now, but seeing these creatures die because of the war is no less horrifying,” she said. “We both wept.”