The body of dolphin stranded on March 22, 2024, on a beach in Akkar. (Credit: Photo sent by Michel Hallak/L'Orient Today)
BEIRUT — A dead cetacean, a type of dolphin, was found on Friday on a beach in Akkar, in North Lebanon, a rather rare phenomenon on the Lebanese coast, according to information from our correspondent in the region, Michel Hallak. The sea creature measures between 3 and 4 meters long and one and a half meters wide.
According to the Center for Maritime Studies of the National Council for Scientific Research (CNRS), which examined the animal, it is a male Risso's dolphin measuring three meters long. Risso's dolphins are a species of cetaceans from the Delphinidae family, according to the environmental association Sentiers du Akkar.
On Friday evening, CNRS issued a press release via Facebook, saying that "on the recommendation of the environmental prosecutor and in coordination with the Ministry of Agriculture and the internal security forces," its scientists "examined the dolphin that died on Akkar beach, autopsied it and took samples [from it]."
The Ministry of Agriculture also dispatched a team to the site to examine the animal, whose cause of death is unknown at this time.
In 2023, two dead dolphins were found on beaches in South Lebanon. In 2020, an orca was stranded on the beach in Sarafand.