Volunteer rescue group saves beached whale sharks along Thiruvananthapuram city’s coastline

Young marine enthusiasts rescue stranded whale sharks in Thiruvananthapuram, raising awareness and saving gentle giants with increasing success.

A volunteer rescue group of young marine wildlife enthusiasts is saving whale sharks stranded on Thiruvananthapuram’s beaches with surprisingly increasing regularity this summer.

Ajith Shanghumughom, a Wildlife Trust of India (WTI) conservator who heads the group, points out that summer is the sharks’ migratory season. While the whale sharks are imposing in size, they are the gentle giants of the deep. He notes that the whale sharks are filter feeders with vestigial teeth, not large marine predators like tiger sharks. Their seasonal migration from the Arabian Sea to Australia’s western coast begins in January and concludes in March.

Since 2021, the group has rescued 23 whale sharks stranded along the contiguous beaches of Thiruvananthapuram and Kanyakumari district in neighbouring Tamil Nadu. 

Fishers say that the whale sharks often get ensnared in nets cast by them off the coast of Shanghumughom. They make the hard choice of cutting the nets loose to free the trapped whale sharks. 

The volunteer group says online video tutorials about rescuing beached whale sharks helped. Whales often play dead when they get accidentally beached to ward off likely predators. Fishers frequently presume them dead and prepare to dispose of the carcasses safely. At Kochuveli beach last week, the group intervened quickly to save a beached whale shark mistakenly thought to be dead by local fishers. 

“We discerned tail muscle pulses and initiated the operation, which lasted over 10 hours. Whale sharks pose no threat to humans. But rescuers are mindful that a mighty lash from the shark’s heavily muscled tail can sometimes be fatal,” a WTI member says. 

Marine poachers extensively hunted whale sharks for their fins and flesh, which are regarded as a delicacy in China and other Asian countries. In 2001, the Union government outlawed the hunting of whale sharks, and in 2019, it banned the export of dried shark fins and meat. The government also declared ₹25,000 in compensation for fishers who lose their nets while freeing whale sharks.