6/20/2006 - Whale at the Poo Pipe
About a month or so ago, I wrote a piece on our regular shore dive here.
Well, yesterday a humpback whale took it over and called it his own. All the more reason NOT to have a super terminal at the Seaway! You can find out more about that mess here.
Text of article
A WHALE made the Southport Seaway its playground for more than three hours yesterday, delighting bystanders with a free whale watching experience, before heading back out to sea.
Whale watching experts were concerned it could have been sick, and others thought it was finding a place to rest or to give birth.
The large humpback drifted slowly up and down the southern wall of the Seaway, at times only 5m from the raised rocky bank where more than 100 onlookers had gathered.
It was the second whale spotted in the Southport Seaway since June 5.
Yesterday's whale entered the Seaway about 11.30am. It was first spotted by The Gold Coast Bulletin boating editor Kevan Wolfe who alerted authorities.
The whale may have mistaken the black bottom of his boat for another whale, said Wolfe.
"We watched it for a little while and stopped the boat and as we sat there it came to the boat, to about two feet way, and was just looking at us with almost soulful eyes," he said.
"I think it may have been sick."
A Maritime Safety Queensland boat, which was already in the area, kept watch on the whale.
Sea World's marine services was notified but did not attend because the whale was not thought to have been in any distress.
Jeff Wemyss, from Coast Guard Southport, said the whale looked disoriented. At times it was drift-ing backwards.
"It's created quite a spectacle. This is fairly rare that they come into the Seaway, into the Broadwater," he said.
One bodyboarder attempted to swim out to it, when it was about 20m from the bank, and got within 10m before concerned adults yelled for him to come back because of the danger.
"I got a good view," said Riley Jones, 16, of Hollywell. "It was way massive. I only wanted to go see what it looked like."
Ignoring the warnings from concerned onlookers, he and three of his friends attempted again a short time later, before being warned off again.
Kyle Waters, 16, and Andrew Shaw, 20, from Brisbane, were snorkelling along the rock edge when they mistook the whale for a rock.
Realising that it was a huge whale, they stayed in the water, even though they admitted to being 'scared'.
About 2pm, when the snorkellers got too close, the whale took off on its slow swim to the Seaway entrance where it stayed before moving back down again. Then there was a new spectacle.
The whale, which started drifting backwards after staying idle for 15 minutes, ran into a pole in the Seaway, appeared to panic and swam back towards the entrance.
It continued to slowly swim back and forth until 3pm when it was last spotted heading out to sea in a northerly direction.
Aimee Hunter, 21, from Parkwood, said her first whale sighting had been 'amazing'.
"We thought it was a rock at first when it first came up," she said.
Peter and Barbara Stolz, of Palm Beach, were at the Seaway for a picnic and got a lot more than they bargained for.
"We didn't expect anything like this," said Mrs Stolz.
"Why pay $85 (for a whale watching cruise) when we've got it here?"
Mr Stolz added: "Let's not build a seaport here, hey."
School groups from Tamborine Mountain State High School and St Michael's College on an excursion found themselves in the right place at the right time.
Spirit of Gold Coast Whale Watching marketing manager Wayne Marsh said without doing tests, it was hard to say why the whale had entered the Seaway.
"I believe it was a sizeable whale, so it wouldn't have been a young one that got lost.
"Being a larger one it may have had some slight illness and sometimes they get disoriented from that fact. It could also have been a large female looking for somewhere to give birth."
Whale Watching Gold Coast skipper Chris Orchard said that the whale might have been resting, knowing there was a tide pushing south.
Managing director Bruce Nicholls said they sighted the whale outside the entrance to the Seaway about 3pm when they were beginning a tour.
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