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Killer Whales Get Stranded Again in Russia's Far East

Rescuers and volunteers try to save killer whales stranded at the mouth of the Bolshaya Vorovskaya River at the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk, on the Kamchatka Peninsula, Russia October 2, 2024. Head of the Sobolevsky Municipal District of the Kamchatka Region Andrei Vorovskiy via VK/Handout via REUTERS
Rescuers and volunteers try to save killer whales stranded at the mouth of the Bolshaya Vorovskaya River at the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk, on the Kamchatka Peninsula, Russia October 2, 2024. Head of the Sobolevsky Municipal District of the Kamchatka Region Andrei Vorovskiy via VK/Handout via REUTERS
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Killer Whales Get Stranded Again in Russia's Far East

Rescuers and volunteers try to save killer whales stranded at the mouth of the Bolshaya Vorovskaya River at the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk, on the Kamchatka Peninsula, Russia October 2, 2024. Head of the Sobolevsky Municipal District of the Kamchatka Region Andrei Vorovskiy via VK/Handout via REUTERS
Rescuers and volunteers try to save killer whales stranded at the mouth of the Bolshaya Vorovskaya River at the coast of the Sea of Okhotsk, on the Kamchatka Peninsula, Russia October 2, 2024. Head of the Sobolevsky Municipal District of the Kamchatka Region Andrei Vorovskiy via VK/Handout via REUTERS

A family of killer whales has again become stranded in a silted estuary in Russia's far east just hours after researchers helped the two adults and two calves into deeper water, the emergency ministry said on Thursday.
Russian researchers and volunteers spent all of Wednesday dousing the killer whales with water after they beached in the estuary on the Kamchatka Peninsula and when the tide rose managed to get the orcas to deeper water.
But on Thursday, the family was again stranded, Reuters reported.
"This morning they swam away from the shallow water towards the open sea," the emergency ministry said.
"Sadly, the animals could not find the narrow exit from the estuary and at low tide they found themselves in shallow water again."
One of the orcas was shown by Izvestia lying in shallow water on its side and was distressed.
The newspaper cited an unidentified source as saying the family group might be refusing to swim into the ocean because one of the group was injured and so was unable to go into deeper waters.
Orcas, or killer whales, belong to the sub-order of toothed whales but are also the largest member of the dolphin family, according to Whale and Dolphin Conservation.

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Swiss Glacier Melt Exceeds Average in 2024 after Hot Summer

This photograph shows the Rhone Glacier and its glacial lake, formed by the melting of the glacier, above Gletsch, in the Swiss Alps, on September 30, 2024. (AFP)
This photograph shows the Rhone Glacier and its glacial lake, formed by the melting of the glacier, above Gletsch, in the Swiss Alps, on September 30, 2024. (AFP)
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Swiss Glacier Melt Exceeds Average in 2024 after Hot Summer

This photograph shows the Rhone Glacier and its glacial lake, formed by the melting of the glacier, above Gletsch, in the Swiss Alps, on September 30, 2024. (AFP)
This photograph shows the Rhone Glacier and its glacial lake, formed by the melting of the glacier, above Gletsch, in the Swiss Alps, on September 30, 2024. (AFP)

Swiss glaciers melted at an above-average rate in 2024 as a blistering hot summer thawed through abundant snowfall, monitoring body GLAMOS said on Tuesday.

Earlier this year, glaciologists had celebrated heavy winter and spring snow dumps in the Alps, hoping this would signal a halt to years of hefty declines or even a reversal of losses.

But with average August temperatures a few degrees above freezing even at the 3,571 meter high Jungfraujoch station perched above the Aletsch Glacier, scientists measured record ice losses across the country that month.

Overall, GLAMOS said Swiss glaciers lost 2.5% of their volume this year which was above the average of the past decade.

"It is worrying to me that despite the perfect year we actually had for glaciers, with the snow-rich winter and the rather cool and rainy spring, it was still not enough," said Matthias Huss, Director of GLAMOS.

"If the trend continues that we have seen in this year, this will be a disaster for Swiss glaciers," he added.

One of the factors that accelerated the losses this year was dust from the Sahara, the report said. This gives ice sheets a brown or rosy hue which inhibits their ability to reflect sunlight back into the atmosphere.

Pictures posted by Huss on social media during data collection trips in recent weeks showed muddy streams snaking through ice sheets so thin that rocks and gravel protruded.

"There is really a relation you build up with the site, with the ice, and it hurts a bit to see how the rocks are simply taking over," he told Reuters earlier this month, while measuring ice on the Pers Glacier in eastern Switzerland.

More than half of the glaciers in the Alps are in Switzerland where temperatures are rising by around twice the global average due to climate change.

Last week, the Swiss government gave approval to revise segments of its border with Italy since the melting of the icy ridges between the two countries has reshaped the watersheds which fix the boundary.

If greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, the Alps' glaciers are expected to lose more than 80% of their current mass by 2100.

Earlier this year, Europe's top human rights court ruled that Switzerland was not doing enough to arrest the impact of climate change. The Swiss government denies this.