April 26, 2026, 3:53 p.mApril 26, 2026, 3:53 p.m
Its transport to the North Sea is scheduled to begin on Tuesday at the earliest – but that didn’t mean peace for the bull whale lying in the shallow water off the Baltic Sea island of Poel over the weekend. During the day, people repeatedly visited the weakened animal, including Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania’s Environment Minister Till Backhaus (SPD). On Sunday morning he went by boat to the whale and touched it.
“We decided to go out to see him again,” he said afterwards. Backhaus said he found it “extremely interesting”. He had already said on Friday that he had been right on him – the whale.
They want to take blood, give water, and possibly also nutritional supplements and vitamins, said small animal doctor Kirsten Tönnies, who was involved in the private initiative to transport the whale. According to initial estimates, the animal, which weighs twelve tons, has lost weight significantly, but the initiative continues to classify it as transportable, said Backhaus. “In any case, he won’t die overnight.”
Locked in a steel tub for days towards the North Sea
According to the initiative’s team, the barge intended to transport the approximately twelve-meter-long humpback whale should arrive on Sunday night or Monday morning. The actual transport with the so-called barge is planned for Tuesday, said diving entrepreneur Fred Babbel, who was involved in the private attempt. The bull whale is to be locked in a kind of steel aquarium for days and transported to the North Sea, more than 400 kilometers away, or even to the Atlantic.
Before Poel, the access from the Wal to the deeper channel will be widened, said Babbel on Sunday morning. “We’re still working, washing up and vacuuming.” The go-ahead for the initiative’s new project was announced by Backhaus on Saturday. The concept is tolerated – the responsibility remains with the initiative.
The whale is supposed to swim through a channel that has been dredged more than a hundred meters wide and onto the barge. “For a wild animal, it’s pretty comfortable within our means,” said Tönnies about the pool. A tracker that has already been attached should later show its further position. However, there is a serious problem: the tracker does not work underwater, said Backhaus. So if the whale were to dive or sink to the bottom and drown, it would probably no longer be detectable. A new solution is being worked on, said the minister.
Every day there is hustle and bustle and noise
For days, people have often been in the immediate vicinity of the humpback whale, and boats and technical equipment are also making noise. The whale seems to accept this calmly and calmly – but according to experts, this impression can be very misleading.
The animal protection organization Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) emphasized that contact with humans always means stress for wild animals. This is also the case with marine mammals such as seals and whales. Physical intervention directly on the whale should only take place in exceptional situations, with as few emergency personnel as possible and for short, targeted measures.
“Wild animals are fundamentally not used to people, which means that any approach and especially noise causes enormous stress and usually triggers escape behavior,” said the German Oceanographic Museum. “The humpback whale has no chance of escaping in its current situation, which makes the situation even more dramatic for it.”
“Cacophony of changing supposed experts”
It would be good to have a competent and experienced team on site with a veterinarian, biologist and boat driver who would be given responsibility, said marine biologist Boris Culik, formerly at the Geomar Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research in Kiel. “We currently have a cacophony of changing supposed experts whose skills and experience no one questions.”
Greenpeace expert Thilo Maack explained: “No wild animal on land, such as a dying wolf, deer or wild boar, would be subjected to such tugging that borders on undignified.” WDC also warned against humanizing interpretations of the behavior. In the last few days, Minister Backhaus has repeatedly heard strongly humanizing sentences, for example on Friday: “When you are with him and he seems to trust you, he raises his head.”
To die in low water?
The humpback whale remained lying in shallow water in the Baltic Sea five times. It is possible that he left first place in front of Timmendorfer Strand just because of the noise around him. “It is entirely conceivable that the whale went into the shallow waters to rest or even die,” the WDC said.
According to Backhaus, the bull whale, which was around four to six years old, was first seen in the Baltic Sea at the beginning of March: on March 3rd it appeared in the harbor of Wismar; later he was stuck further west off Timmendorfer Strand (Schleswig-Holstein). In the more than 50 days since then he has been in shallow water zones for well over half of the time. Experts suspect that he may have specifically visited her again and again because he was seriously ill and was looking for peace.
As with the animal’s brief swim away on Monday, there were rising water levels on Sunday. This time there may not have been enough strength: the whale stayed lying down for the time being. (sda/dpa/fwa)