VISITORS to Yaverland beach were surprised to see a whale, a dolphin and a seal being rescued by a group from British Divers Marine Life Rescue.

Luckily the sea mammals were only models and no sea life was in danger this time. But the BDMLR was running a special training course on May 9 for new mammal medics to learn how to save a whale if it did become stranded.

“During this training course we have trained nine new marine mammal medics from Isle of Wight, Berkshire, Kent and Dorset,” said Dr Stephan Voigt, who with Nigel Dove and Dale Evans co-ordinates the BDMLR on the Island. “Six already trained Isle of Wight BDMLR medics did help to run the course and took part in the refresher course as well, and it was run by national co-ordinator Trevor Weeks.

“The training course consists of a theory and a practical part. The theory sessions consist of lectures about anatomy, physiology and pathology of cetaceans (whales and dolphins) and pinnepeds (seals). It addressed different options regarding rescue, rehabilitation, euthanasia and release of the animals concerned.

“Another part of the theory lectures focused on the assessment of the animal at the scene, first aid, manual handling and health and safety whilst working with marine animals.

“The practical on the beach focused on first aid procedures, different re-flotation techniques of whales and dolphins as well as first aid and capture techniques of seals. Life-sized dummies (seal, bottlenose dolphin and pilot whale) will be used to teach different techniques how to recover and re-float the different types of animals.”

Members of the BDMLR helped with the Northern Bottlenose Whale that became stranded at Hayling Island in August 2008. Unfortunately teams were unable to save this whale and it had to be put to sleep, but other Island incidents can be viewed at www.iow-bdmlr.co.uk/incidents/

British Divers Marine Life Rescue is an organisation dedicated to the rescue and well being of all marine animals in distress around the UK. They are a network of trained and professional marine mammal medics who respond to call outs from the general public, HM Coastguard, Police and RSPCA.

“In fact, we are the primary marine animal rescue organisation in the country and are not only called upon by the other emergency services, but also train their staff,” said Dr Voigt.

“Our rescue teams are on call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. We have a wide range of equipment strategically placed throughout the country to deal with strandings of marine animals, oil spills, fishing gear entanglement and in fact any type of marine animal in trouble. This includes rescue boats, equipment trailers, whale and dolphin pontoon sets, a whale disentanglement kit and each area has a medic kit with essential supplies. In 2008 BDMLR moved from being a purely rescue organisation and opened a specialist seal hospital in the remote Scottish highlands which wasn’t being covered before.”

British Divers Marine Life Rescue is a registered charity no 803438 (Lime House Regency Close, Uckfield, East Sussex, TN22 1DS, UK), is entirely funded by donations and can only run the emergency service for marine animals with the support of the public and BDMLR supporters. For more information see the national BDMLR website: http://www.bdmlr.org.uk/ or the local IoW BDMLR website: http://www.iow-bdmlr.co.uk/