Why are they so suicidal to beach themselves and die?
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Australia: Dark, shiny and sleek but not alive, that is how about 200 pilot whales are perishing on a beach in the west coast of Tasmania, Australia.
Rescuers who are struggling to help them say that just 35 of the 230 beached whales are still alive, according to AFP news agency.
The black mammals that can grow to more than six metres (20 feet) long are strewn along the beach having been stuck on the waterline.
Scientists are clueless as to why the whales on a large scale crawl on the shore and get stuck there, only to die.
They suggest that pilot whales being highly sociable might follow podmates that end up in danger.
Others believe that whales take the slopping beaches like the one in Tasmania for open waters and end up there.
Locals volunteered to help the whales by covering with blankets, dousing them with sea water to keep them alive until more help arrived, according to the report.
This is not the first time whale beaching happening. Only two years ago nearby Macquarie Harbour saw mass stranding of whales numbering about 500 of them.
Back then, more than 300 of them perished nevertheless dozens of volunteers for days worked to save them.
Just days ago a dozen young male sperm whales found dead in on King Island between Tasmania and the Australian mainland, which the officials called a " misadventure".
Strandings are common in New Zealand with around 300 animals beach themselves annually.
