Wollongong City Council says it cost more than $44,000 to retrieve and dispose of a juvenile humpback whale that drowned after becoming entangled in a shark net off Coledale last month.<\/p>\n
The 4.7-tonne whale washed onto rocks at Scarborough Beach on the evening of October 27, forcing the council to undertake a complex and hazardous recovery operation.<\/p>\n
A council report on the task found it required specialist contractors, cranes, trucks and staff working in heavy surf “with the presence of multiple sharks in the vicinity”.<\/p>\n
The report said that while the NSW Environment Protection Authority waived part of the waste levy, the operation still cost more than $44,000.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The whale drifted onto Scarborough Beach after becoming entangled in a Coledale shark net. (Supplied: Anthony Turner)<\/p>\n
A necropsy conducted by Taronga’s Australian Registry of Wildlife Health found the whale most likely drowned due to entanglement in shark netting managed by the NSW Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development.<\/p>\n
The report said the council’s general manager had written to Agriculture Minister Tara Moriarty seeking reimbursement, although the NSW government said the minister’s office had not yet received the letter.<\/p>\n
The council formally requested the removal of the nets in 2021.<\/p>\n
Parliamentary debate<\/p>\n
The whale’s death prompted heated debate in the NSW Upper House, where Greens MLC Cate Faehrmann accused the government of failing to end the “outdated, archaic technology” of shark-net programs that continued to kill marine life.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Cate Faehrmann has called for greater accountability over the state’s shark-net program. (Supplied: NSW Legislative Council)<\/p>\n
She described the recovery as a dangerous and complex operation, with staff on slippery rocks amid waves and circling sharks.<\/p>\n
“There were also shark fishers \u2014 as in fisher people that had come to the area, that were trying to capture the sharks to put on Instagram,” she said.<\/p>\n
Ms Faehrmann said the drowning of the young whale was a predictable outcome and called on the government to commit to permanent removal of nets across the state’s beaches or expect more deaths.<\/p>\n
“It is going to have more blood on its hands.”<\/p>\n
Animal Justice Party MLC Emma Hurst supported the call, saying the nets were “not protecting human life”, and urged better community education and funding for more lifesavers.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Wollongong Council says it spent more than $44,000 removing the whale. (Supplied: Illawarra and Surrounds Marine Life Sightings)<\/p>\n
Responding in parliament, Ms Moriarty said the government was trialling new shark-mitigation technologies such as smart drum lines and drone surveillance, but needed to ensure their effectiveness before phasing out nets entirely.<\/p>\n
She said the government had already shortened the annual netting season and removed nets a month earlier last summer.<\/p>\n
Ms Faehrmann urged Ms Moriarty to reimburse Wollongong council for the recovery, but the minister did not directly respond to the question.<\/p>\n
‘Grown-up conversation’<\/p>\n
Councillor Jess Whittaker said she appreciated the council’s efforts to seek reimbursement.<\/p>\n
“It’s astronomical and our budgets are really tight,” she said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Jess Whittaker says council should be reimbursed for the $44,000 cost. (Supplied: Whittaker)<\/p>\n
“Because it was their netting program that caused the whale’s death, and then their failure to secure the whale \u2026 allowed it to drift onto a dangerous rock platform.<\/p>\n
“As soon as it hit the shore, it became the council’s responsibility under legislation. I just think it’s really unfair that the government mismanaged this so poorly, and we are left to cover the costs.”<\/p>\n
Councillor Whittaker said the shark nets did not provide effective protection for swimmers, and acted more as a “marine culling device”.<\/p>\n
She said politicians should make evidence-based decisions rather than pandering to public fear of sharks as “these Jaws-like beasts”.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The whale was found entangled in a shark net in Coledale. (Supplied: Khynan Gardner\/ORRCA)<\/p>\n
Councillor Whittaker urged the minister to have a “grown-up conversation” with the community about “nature and about our relationship with the ocean and how we move forward as a community and in keeping people safe and looking after the environment”.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wollongong City Council says it cost more than $44,000 to retrieve and dispose of a juvenile humpback whale…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":279318,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[161851,64,63,1783,2467,7186,161850,128,2269,38810,338],"class_list":["post-279317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-161851","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-compensation","tag-council","tag-nets","tag-retrieval","tag-science","tag-shark","tag-whale","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279317\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/279318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}