• We have updated the guidelines regarding posting political content: please see the stickied thread on Website Issues.

Animal Army (Animals Trained Or Exploited For Warfare)

Scientists train wasps for war on terror

Mimi Hall
USA Today
Dec. 27, 2005 08:12 AM

Scientists at a Georgia laboratory have developed what could be a low-tech, low-cost weapon in the war on terrorism: trained wasps.

The tiny, non-stinging wasps can check for hidden explosives at airports and monitor for toxins in subway tunnels.

"You can rear them by the thousands, and you can train them within a matter of minutes," says Joe Lewis, a U.S. Agriculture Department entomologist. "This is just the very tip of the iceberg of a very new resource."
advertisement


Lewis and others at the University of Georgia-Tifton Campus developed a handheld "Wasp Hound" to contain the wasps while they sniff out chemicals and other substances.

Lewis and his partner, University of Georgia biological engineer Glen Rains, say their device is ready for pilot tests and could be available for commercial use in five to 10 years.

Rains says the wasps could one day be used instead of dogs to check for explosives in cargo containers coming in to the nation's seaports, in vehicles crossing at border checkpoints, at airports and anywhere else where security should be tight.

"It's real easy to learn how to work with them," he says about the wasps. "You could show somebody what to do in 30 to 40 minutes. And they're very specific in what they learn."

This new method comes as the government has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on high-tech equipment and training since 9/11 to secure the nation from another terrorist attack.

Bomb-sniffing dogs cost thousands of dollars and take months to train. High-tech equipment can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars per unit and often has spotty performance.

"We don't have portable, flexible systems," Lewis says.

Scientists started working with the species, a type of parasitic wasp called Microplitis croceipes, decades ago - long before the terrorist attacks in 2001.

In the 1990s, the Defense Department paid for part of that work to find out whether wasps could be used for a variety of defense purposes, including sniffing out land mines. They couldn't do that well because the areas they would have to check are too vast.

The scientists - funded by the Agriculture Department and the University of Georgia - have looked at other uses for the wasps.

Rains says the wasps can be trained to detect fungal diseases on crops while the damage is still below ground and can't be seen.

This method would help farmers avoid having to spread toxic fungicide over an entire crop after the disease spreads. Rains says farmers would save money while providing a health benefit for consumers and the environment.

The wasps may also be trained for medical uses, including detecting cancer or ulcers by smelling someone's breath.

They probably can be trained like dogs to find bodies buried in rubble, Rains says.

Given the strong government effort since 9/11 to focus on the nation's security, the scientists see a vast market for the wasps to detect explosives.

The wasps are trained with sugar water by using the classical conditioning techniques made famous by Pavlov's dogs. Rains says the wasps are sensitive to a host of chemical odors, including 2,4-DNT, a volatile compound used in dynamite.

To do their work, five wasps - each a half-inch long - are placed in a plastic cylinder that is 15 inches tall. This "Wasp Hound," which costs roughly $100 per unit, has a vent in one end and a camera that connects to a laptop computer.

When the wasps pick up an odor they've been trained to detect they gather by the vent - a response that can be measured by the computer or actually seen by observers.

Lewis says the wasps, when exposed to some chemicals, "can detect as low as four parts per billion, which is an incredibly small amount."

He says the "ability to capture nature and its marvels is ... revolutionary."

Rains says, "The sensitivity of animals (and insects) to chemicals in general is probably beyond what we can comprehend. We don't really know what the limits are."
Click to expand...

www.azcentral.com/offbeat/articles/1227Wasps-ON.html
 
More on the sea lions.

Sea Lions Help U.S. Navy Handcuff Enemy Divers and Sweep Mines
http://www.popsci.com/technology/articl ... emy-divers
What you gonna do when the sea lions come for you?
By Jeremy Hsu Posted 11.25.2009 at 1:58 pm 2 Comments



Sea Lion Diver: This mine stands no chance against Navy-trained sea lions BARCROFT

Californian sea lions have become U.S. Navy recruits alongside dolphins and human divers, as seen in this amazing picture. The Daily Telegraph reports that this particular fellow put on a display for officials at the NATO Underwater Research Center in La Spezia Bay, Italy.

The sea lion demonstrated his minesweeping skills by swimming down to a fake mine and putting a clamp onto the device, so that handlers from the U.S. Navy's Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center Pacific could reel it in. The sea lion has also learned to attach leg cuffs to enemy divers, immobilizing them and allowing human sailors on the surface to pull in the intruders. A special sea lion harness can also carry cameras that provide live underwater video.


Related Articles
Navy Wants High-Powered Laser for Fending Off Small Boats
Navy Reveals Details of Submarine-Based Drones
Hydrogen-Powered Navy UAV Shatters Flight Endurance Record

Tags
Technology, Jeremy Hsu, cuffs, dolphins, marine mammals, mines, naval, navy, saboteurs, sea lions, sea mammals, seals, terrorists, underwater diversThe U.S. Navy has now begun using its sea lions to patrol for terrorists or other underwater saboteurs at a base in Washington State.

The fine Navy tradition involving sea mammals also includes using dolphins to mark underwater mines during Operation Iraqi Freedom. The Daily Telegraph notes that the Navy's ranks now include 28 California sea lions, 80 Atlantic and Pacific bottlenose dolphins, and a Beluga whale.

Now Hollywood just needs to add sea lions, dolphins and Navy lasers to a revised underwater fight scene ala Thunderball, and it has the next Bond film's climactic piece.
Click to expand...
 
Darpa’s Plan to Recruit Military Dogs: Scan Their Brains
BY ROBERT BECKHUSEN01.25.135:20 PM
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2013/01/dog-brains/

“Suk,” an Air Force working dog, training at Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico, on Aug. 15, 2012. Photo: Air Force

Dogs do it all for the military: sniff for bombs, detect narcotics and rescue hapless humans. But to recruit the best canine squadmates, the Pentagon’s blue-sky researchers are working on a plan to scan their brains — and figure out how dogs think. Belly rubs won’t cut it anymore.

According to a new research solicitation from Darpa, the project — adorably called FIDOS, for “Functional Imaging to Develop Outstanding Service-Dogs” — touts the idea of using magnetic image resonators (or MRIs) to “optimize the selection of ideal service dogs” by scanning their brains to find the smartest candidates. “Real-time neural feedback” will optimize canine training. That adds up to military pooches trained better, faster and — in theory — at a lower cost than current training methods of $20,000, using the old-fashioned methods of discipline-and-reward.

Though it’s still very much in the research stage, the plan owes many of its underpinnings to several recent discoveries about the brains of our canine friends.

Last year, Emory University neuroscientist Greg Berns and his colleagues trained dogs to sit unrestrained inside an MRI machine, shown hand signals associated with a food reward, and then scanned. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the researchers noticed increased brain activity in the dogs’ ventral caudate, a region of the brain associated with the neurotransmitter dopamine.


In their study, published last April in Public Library of Science One, Berns and his colleagues concluded that the activity was due to a “trained association to a food reward; however, it is also possible that some component of social reward contributes to the response.” Anyone who’s ever held out a piece of chicken to a well-behaved pup already knows that dogs like getting fed when they’re good. And dogs are highly social animals, closely adapted to human behavior given a shared evolutionary history. But the Emory University team was the first to observe this specific brain activity using MRIs.

That seems to have perked Darpa’s interest. (The researchers have even kicked around the idea of using machines to automate puppy training.) The agency believes it may be possible to screen “high-value service dogs … based on their neutral activation to specific handler training cues,” Darpa notes in the solicitation. The idea is that dogs who show greater brain activity when given such cues will be “faster and easier to train” than dogs that show less activity. And instead of merely using approximations of something the dog wants, to make the dog do something else, handlers could fine-tune their techniques to more closely match the chemical responses happening inside the dog’s head.

Neuroimaging may also help spot “brain hyper-social dogs.” These very social dogs, once scanned and located, could be selected for use in rehabilitative therapy for soldiers exhibiting symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injuries.

One way to locate those pups, the solicitation suggests, is to scan dogs that show “neurophysiological markers of handler stress and anxiety.” That hypothesis is roughly based on research showing that dogs can follow along to the human gaze and finger-pointing, and how dogs catch yawns from their owners at a greater rate than strangers — a possible hint of a canine theory of mind, or their ability to understand and interpret human intentions distinct from their own.

Thus, when a handler is showing symptoms of trauma in the form of stress, the dogs that sense it best could make for ideal therapy partners. And in all areas of military pooch-work, the particular breeds sought by the military — like the Belgian Malinois — are highly selective: a “scarce canine resource” that needs to be managed carefully.

Fortunately, getting dogs inside an MRI chamber shouldn’t be too much of a problem, as pups can be trained in a few months to obediently rest inside, all cute and snugly-like.
Click to expand...
 
A dolphin purportedly conducting a "spying mission for the Israeli government" has been apprehended by the Gaza-based militant group Hamas in the Mediterranean sea, it was reported on Wednesday.

The dolphin caught the attention of the Palestinian militants because it was conducting “suspicious” manoeuvres in the water, Hamas said.

The group controlling the coastal enclave said the dolphin had been equipped with “video cameras” and other "espionage" tools.

According to the Al Quds publication, the dolphin was also carrying a device capable of firing arrows which could harm a human being. The animal remains in Hamas custody.

Dolphins, as well as sea lions, have been used for military purposes by the US and other armies since the 1960s.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...sraeli-spy-dolphin-caught-off-Gaza-coast.html
 
Bump ... The chicken-warmed nuke story is cited in this Live Science compendium of weird weapons. This new mention links back to the same 2004 BBC item.

Chicken nuclear weapons
During the height of the Cold War, the British devised a 7-tonne (8 tons) nuclear weapon called Blue Peacock, a massive nuclear mine to be placed in Germany that could be detonated if the Soviets decided to invade from the East. One problem? The ground gets really, really cold in winter, making it hard for all the equipment in the mine to work. So, one outlandish proposal (along with wrapping the machinery in fiberglass pillows) was to heat the nuke with chickens, who would have been encased in a shell and given enough food, water and oxygen to survive for a week. The heat generated by the chickens could keep the project warm enough to function. Ultimately, the plan was scrapped because of the risk of nuclear fallout, according to the BBC.
Click to expand...

SOURCE: https://www.livescience.com/60575-weirdest-military-weapons.html
 
Here's a 2011 article (with photo) concerning the oft-cited Pigeon Project in which B. F. Skinner was involved ...

B.F. Skinner’s Pigeon-Guided Rocket

It’s 1943, and America desperately needs a way to reliably bomb targets in Nazi Germany. What do we do? For B.F. Skinner, noted psychologist and inventor, the answer was obvious: pigeons.

“During World War II, there was a grave concern about aiming missiles,” says Peggy Kidwell, a curator of Medicine and Science at the American History Museum. “Military officials really wanted to figure out how to aim them accurately,” Skinner approached the National Research Defense Committee with his plan, code-named “Project Pigeon.” Members of the committee were doubtful, but granted Skinner $25,000 to get started. ...


Skinner had already used pigeons in his psychological research, training them to press levers for food. An obsessive inventor, he had been pondering weapons targeting systems one day when he saw a flock of birds maneuvering in formation in the sky. “Suddenly I saw them as ‘devices’ with excellent vision and extraordinary maneuverability,” he said. “Could they not guide a missile? Was the answer to the problem waiting for me in my own back yard?”

Getting to work, Skinner decided on pigeons because of both their vision and unflappable behavior in chaotic conditions. He built a nose cone for a missile fitted with three small electronic screens and three tiny pigeon cockpits. Onto the screens was projected an image of the ground in front of the rocket.

“He would train street pigeons to recognize the pattern of the target, and to peck when they saw this target,” says Kidwell. “And then when all three of them pecked, it was thought you could actually aim the missile in that direction.” As the pigeons pecked, cables harnessed to each one’s head would mechanically steer the missile until it finally reached its mark. Alas, without an escape hatch, the birds would perish along with their target, making it a kamikaze mission.

Despite a successful demonstration of the trained pigeons, officials remained skeptical and eventually decided to terminate the project.
Click to expand...

FULL STORY: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/bf-skinners-pigeon-guided-rocket-53443995/
 
Dogs have been recorded as being employed in battle as far back as 600 BCE.

dogs-war copy.jpg

Dogs in Ancient Warfare
E. S. Forster
Greece & Rome, Vol. 10, No. 30 (May, 1941), pp. 114-117

SOURCE: https://www.jstor.org/stable/641375?read-now=1&seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
 
U.S. Navy Dolphins Recovered a Rare 19th Century Torpedo

Of the 50 Howell torpedoes ever built, only two survived as display pieces. But in 2013, a U.S. Navy dolphin on a routine training mission in San Diego, California, discovered a third torpedo on the bottom of the ocean. The dolphin—officially a Mark 7 Marine Mammal System—discovered the torpedo despite it being in pieces and largely buried in sea floor sediment.


Navy divers, acting on the Mark 7’s urging, investigated and discovered two pieces of a Howell torpedo. The torpedo featured an engraving on the nose cone that identified it as “No. 24.” The Underwater Archaeology Branch used the information to discover the identity of the torpedo:

(The branch) “conducted extensive archival research, leading to the discovery of a 20 December 1899 entry in USS Iowa's deck log that stated, "Lost H. Mark I, No. 24 torpedo...". USS Iowa had anchored off the coast of San Diego to conduct target practice. A practice warhead was used in training exercises, fastened onto the torpedo with only four pins and a screw. The practice head may have become detached from the torpedo body, which could explain why it was never recovered.
Click to expand...

The torpedo pieces were shipped to the Naval History and Heritage Command’s Underwater Archaeology and Conservation Laboratory in Washington, D.C., to begin a lengthy preservation process. The pieces were immersed in a series of chemical baths to stabilize them. Next, 220 pounds of mineral buildup were painstakingly removed from the torpedo with pneumatic chisels and hand tools.

No. 24 is currently on temporary display at the U.S. Naval Undersea Museum along with a complete Howell torpedo.

800px-Howell_torpedo.jpg


Howell torpedo at the Naval War College Museum in Newport, Rhode Island

https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a32477708/navy-dolphin-torpedo/

maximus otter
 
Was it shiny to begin with?

And think of the potential for under water archaeology...
 
The seminal American intelligence(?) service OSS experimented with the idea of inserting glowing foxes into Japan to frighten the presumably superstitious Japanese. Hilarity (and no small measure of fox maltreatment) ensued.
The Unsuccessful WWII Plot to Fight the Japanese With Radioactive Foxes

An outlandish idea codenamed ‘Operation Fantasia’ aimed to demoralize the Axis power by mimicking legendary spirits

In the wake of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, “Wild Bill” Donovan, the leader of the Office of Strategic Services—America’s wartime intelligence agency—told his scientists to find a way to “outfox” the Axis enemies. In response, the scientists produced a number of dirty tricks, including explosive pancake mix, incendiary bombs strapped to live bats, truth drugs for eliciting information from prisoners of war, and a foul-smelling spray that mimicked the repulsive odor of fecal matter. In other words, desperate times called for desperate measures. Among these outlandish strategies, Operation Fantasia was the most desperate—and peculiar—of them all.

Operation Fantasia was the brainchild of OSS psychological warfare strategist Ed Salinger, an eccentric businessman who had run an import/export business in Tokyo before the war. Salinger’s business dealings had given him a cursory introduction to Japanese culture; he learned the language, collected the art and studied the superstitions—which is why the OSS hired him. Operation Fantasia, he pitched the organization in 1943, would destroy Japanese morale by exposing soldiers and civilians to a Shinto portent of doom: kitsune, fox-shaped spirits with magical abilities. “The foundation for the proposal,” Salinger wrote in a memo outlining his idea, “rests upon the fact that the modern Japanese is subject to superstitions, beliefs in evil spirits and unnatural manifestations which can be provoked and stimulated.” ...

When it came to the question of how to create fake kitsune, the OSS dreamt up a gaggle of ideas. First, OSS personnel fashioned fox-shaped balloons to fly over Japanese villages and scare the citizens below. They also asked a whistle company to create an instrument that simulated fox sounds. ... In addition to the balloons and whistles, the OSS hired another company to create artificial fox odors. ... But despite Salinger’s best efforts, the balloons, whistles, and odors were abandoned as impractical before being deployed. Instead, the OSS reverted to Salinger’s original plan: Catch live foxes in China and Australia, spray-paint them with glowing paint, and release them throughout Japanese villages. ...
Click to expand...

{Long List of Laughable Gambits Omitted ... }

None of the aforementioned harebrained schemes ever went beyond the planning and experimental stages.

As early as September 24, 1943, Stanley Lovell, the head of the OSS Research and Development Branch responsible for overseeing Fantasia, recommended in a meeting that they abandon the operation. He couldn’t understand why nobody else questioned its logic, feasibility or rationality. ... Lovell had established his reputation in the OSS by pursuing eccentric ideas himself, such as trying to make Adolf Hitler’s mustache fall out by slipping female sex hormones into his vegetables ... but Operation Fantasia went beyond his tolerance for absurdity. ...
Click to expand...

FULL STORY: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/hist...t-fight-japanese-radioactive-foxes-180975932/
 
The luminous foxes to be parachuted in presumably. The Hitler moustache plan was a classic - how it would target his upper lip isn't clear.
 
Initial prototype R&D has demonstrated the utility of fitting augmented reality goggles on military dogs to aid in cueing and controlling them.

Augmented-reality-dog.jpg

Augmented reality goggles could help military dogs find bombs, chemicals

Researchers have developed augmented reality goggles that would allow handlers to give commands to military working dogs while staying out of harm's way.

The military often uses dogs to scout areas for explosive devices and hazardous materials and to assist in rescue operations. ...

But working dogs need handlers who can give them commands while they work -- typically by using hand signals or laser pointers, which can pose a safety risk by providing a light source. ...

Handlers have tried audio communication -- using a camera and walkie talkie placed on the dog -- but the verbal commands can be confusing for the dog.

So researchers funded by the Army's Small Business Innovation Research program and managed by the Army Research Office have developed goggles dogs can wear while working -- and get directional commands from soldiers working elsewhere.

The first prototype was built by Command Sight, a Seattle-based company started in 2017 by A.J. Peper to bridge human-animal communication. ...

The goggles are tailored to fit each dog and have a visual indicator that lets the dog be directed to a specific spot by responding to a visual cue in the goggles, using input from a soldier, who can see everything the dog sees while using a separate device.

"Augmented reality works differently for dogs than for humans," said Dr. Stephen Lee, a senior scientist with the Army Research Office. "AR will be used to provide dogs with commands and cues; it's not for the dog to interact with it like a human does. This new technology offers us a critical tool to better communicate with military working dogs." ...
Click to expand...

FULL STORY: https://www.upi.com/Defense-News/20...tary-dogs-find-bombs-chemicals/7141602022656/
 
Last edited:
Kondoru said:
You mean dogs are experts on tanks identification?
Click to expand...
Well. Russian tanks ran on petrol and one sort of engine oil. German tanks tended to run on diesel and other sorts of lubricants. Dogs are good at telling smells apart - for instance, Russian tobacco smoked by their handlers as opposed to German cigarettes. The Russian mine-dogs were fed underneath tanks - Russian tanks - to get them habituated to running underneath tanks for food and shelter. The mines they would carry on their backs had upward-pointed pressure fuses, so if they ran under a tank wearing one - bang. The problem was... they hadn't been habituated to seek food and shelter underneath German tanks. Released on a battlefield, frightened and nervous dogs tended to run for familiar comforting places.

The experiment was discontinued.
 
Tribble said:
Do we have a thread for animals trained for unconventional warfare?

So there's been tales of spy sharks, dolphin assassins, turtle armies... now we have slightly annoying (or rather needy) Beluga whales.

https://www.theguardian.com/environ...could-be-russian-weapon-say-norwegian-experts

(there is the possibility that the harness was a tracking device monitoring migration patterns or suchlike)
Click to expand...

He now needs a new home.

A mysterious beluga whale was dubbed a spy when he appeared off Norway's coast wearing a Russian harness. Two years on, little more is known of the animal's past, but now activists are concerned for his future welfare.

One campaign group led by an American filmmaker wants to create a sanctuary and is urging Norway to support it.
Short presentational grey line

The whale's first known sighting in Norway came at the end of April 2019, when a blob of white flashed past fishermen near the islands of Ingoya and Rolvsoya. This was strange because belugas are rarely seen this far south of the high Arctic. Stranger still was the harness wrapped tightly around the whale's body.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-56956365
 
Retiring after a rather illustrious career.

Magawa the rat, who was awarded a gold medal for his heroism, is retiring from his job detecting landmines.

In a five-year career, the rodent sniffed out 71 landmines and dozens more unexploded items in Cambodia. But his handler Malen says the seven-year-old African giant pouched rat is "slowing down" as he reaches old age, and she wants to "respect his needs".

There are thought to be up to six million landmines in the South East Asian country.

Magawa was trained by the Belgium-registered charity Apopo, which is based in Tanzania and has been raising the animals - known as HeroRATs - to detect landmines since the 1990s. The animals are certified after a year of training. Last week, Apopo said a new batch of young rats had been assessed by the Cambodian Mine Action Centre (CMAC) and passed "with flying colours".

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-57345703
 
ramonmercado said:
Retiring after a rather illustrious career.

Magawa the rat, who was awarded a gold medal for his heroism, is retiring from his job detecting landmines.

In a five-year career, the rodent sniffed out 71 landmines and dozens more unexploded items in Cambodia. But his handler Malen says the seven-year-old African giant pouched rat is "slowing down" as he reaches old age, and she wants to "respect his needs".

There are thought to be up to six million landmines in the South East Asian country.

Magawa was trained by the Belgium-registered charity Apopo, which is based in Tanzania and has been raising the animals - known as HeroRATs - to detect landmines since the 1990s. The animals are certified after a year of training. Last week, Apopo said a new batch of young rats had been assessed by the Cambodian Mine Action Centre (CMAC) and passed "with flying colours".

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-57345703
Click to expand...

The struggle continues.

A rat named in memory of a landmine clearance expert and former British soldier is continuing his work 25 years after his murder.

The landmine-sniffing rat Howes has just started her new job clearing the deadly legacy of conflict in Cambodia. Christopher Howes from Backwell, North Somerset and his colleague Houn Hourth were killed by the Khmer Rouge in 1996.

The idea to name the rat came from two of Howes' old school friends after they visited Cambodia to honour his work.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-somerset-57866990
 
R.I.P Magawa

Magawa, the famous mine-clearing rat who was awarded a gold medal for his heroism, has died at the age of eight.

In a five-year career, the rodent sniffed out over 100 landmines and other explosives in Cambodia.

Magawa was the most successful rat trained by the Belgian charity Apopo to alert human handlers about the mines so they can be safely removed.

The charity said the African giant pouch rat "passed away peacefully" at the weekend.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-59951255
 
Now a mine-clearing JRT. Vid at link.

Ukraine war: Minesweeping dog helps clear Chernihiv of Russian explosives

A Jack Russell has been hard at work helping to remove explosive devices left behind by Russian troops.

Patron is currently working in the Chernihiv region, north of Kyiv, and has so far helped to remove hundreds of devices.

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-europe-61099213
 
The JRT gets a medal.

A Ukrainian mine-sniffing dog has been given a medal for his services to the country since Russia's invasion.

Patron, a Jack Russell terrier, was presented with the award by Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky at a ceremony in Kyiv. The two-and-a-half-year-old has been credited with helping minesweepers find more than 200 devices. He has also become something of a national hero, a symbol of Ukraine's resistance against Russia.

"I want to award those Ukrainian heroes who are already clearing our land of mines. And together with our heroes - a wonderful little sapper Patron who helps not only to neutralize explosives, but also to teach our children the necessary safety rules in areas where there is a mine threat," President Zelensky said during Sunday's ceremony.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-61376816
 

Russian 'spy' whale surfaces in Sweden​


A harness-wearing Beluga whale that turned up in Norway in 2019, sparking speculation it was a spy trained by the Russian navy, has appeared off Sweden's coast, an organisation following him said Monday.

0a5a7dce8096bc7f82d4dffb0c5a8c3dfb131f56.webp


A 2019 image from the Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries (Sea Surveillance Service) shows a white whale now observed off Sweden's southwestern coast wearing a harness © Jorgen REE WIIG / NTB Scanpix/AFP/File

First discovered in Norway's far northern region of Finnmark, the whale spent more than three years slowly moving down the top half of the Norwegian coastline, before suddenly speeding up in recent months to cover the second half and on to Sweden.

On Sunday, he was observed in Hunnebostrand, off Sweden's southwestern coast.

Norwegians nicknamed it "Hvaldimir" -- a pun on the word "whale" in Norwegian, hval, and a nod to its alleged association to Russia.

When he first appeared in Norway's Arctic, marine biologists from the Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries removed an attached man-made harness.

The harness had a mount suited for an action camera and the words "Equipment St. Petersburg" printed on the plastic clasps.

Directorate officials said Hvaldimir may have escaped an enclosure, and may have been trained by the Russian navy as it appeared to be accustomed to humans.

Moscow never issued any official reaction to Norwegian speculation he could be a "Russian spy".

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20230529-russian-spy-whale-surfaces-in-sweden

maximus otter
 
maximus otter said:

Russian 'spy' whale surfaces in Sweden​


A harness-wearing Beluga whale that turned up in Norway in 2019, sparking speculation it was a spy trained by the Russian navy, has appeared off Sweden's coast, an organisation following him said Monday.

0a5a7dce8096bc7f82d4dffb0c5a8c3dfb131f56.webp


A 2019 image from the Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries (Sea Surveillance Service) shows a white whale now observed off Sweden's southwestern coast wearing a harness © Jorgen REE WIIG / NTB Scanpix/AFP/File

First discovered in Norway's far northern region of Finnmark, the whale spent more than three years slowly moving down the top half of the Norwegian coastline, before suddenly speeding up in recent months to cover the second half and on to Sweden.

On Sunday, he was observed in Hunnebostrand, off Sweden's southwestern coast.

Norwegians nicknamed it "Hvaldimir" -- a pun on the word "whale" in Norwegian, hval, and a nod to its alleged association to Russia.

When he first appeared in Norway's Arctic, marine biologists from the Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries removed an attached man-made harness.

The harness had a mount suited for an action camera and the words "Equipment St. Petersburg" printed on the plastic clasps.

Directorate officials said Hvaldimir may have escaped an enclosure, and may have been trained by the Russian navy as it appeared to be accustomed to humans.

Moscow never issued any official reaction to Norwegian speculation he could be a "Russian spy".

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20230529-russian-spy-whale-surfaces-in-sweden

maximus otter
Click to expand...
Does anone else feel sorry for the poor lonely beast? S/he is a long way from other Belugas and seems to be seeking human company.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top