Giant Guardians of the Deep Seas: Spring Expedition

Tim Awbery • 24 April 2019

The Giant Guardians of Deep Seas 2019 Spring Expedition is in full swing!


This is the fourth day of our expedition across the big blue of the east, the neglected child of the Mediterranean! We set sail this morning with the first light of the day from Marmaris with a nice breeze following us on our wat. Eventually, we had led the sails and nagged the engine off and there we were in the international waters just before the sunset. Unfortunately, however far we go, we still come across the footprints and impacts of the man-made world. Although the sea looked calm on the surface, there was the unbearable noise of the sonar underneath. It was impossible for us to track down the whales with our passive acoustic monitoring equipment or have a chance of a sighting at the surface with the constant drone of sonar in the background. 

Just as we were losing hope, something unexpected happened and we were able to hear sperm whales - the giant guardians of deep seas! There they were. We tracked them for almost three hours until we dived into a storm and had to leave the site without any visual contact and carried eastwards. Since then, the sea has been silent with some occasional dolphin sightings and fellow shearwaters hoping to get some fish from us. 

Today, we will reach an area in which fin whales were recently seen. Fingers crossed maybe we will be lucky enough to get a sighting this time!


Akdeniz’in göz ardı edilen çocuğu, Doğunun engin maviliği ile kucaklaşmamızın dördüncü günündeyiz. Günün ilk ışıklarıyla Marmaris’ten derin denizler seferimize açılırken yol boyunca bize taze bahar meltemleri eşlik etti. Nihayetinde, uluslararası sulara vardığımızda güneş batmak üzereydi. Ne yazık ki, ne kadar uzağa gidersek gidelim, insanın ayak izinden ve yarattığı etkiden kaçmak mümkün olmuyor. Deniz yüzeyde son derece sakin ve pürüzsüz görünse de, sualtı dayanılmaz bir sonar sesiyle adeta çalkanıyordu Bu duraksız ve amansız ses oldukça bizim derin denizlerin devlerini ne duyabilmemiz ne de görebilmemiz mümkündü. 

Derken, beklenmeyen oldu ve onları duyabilmeyi başardık. İşte oradaydı, Kaşalotlar! Fırtınaya yakalanana kadar üç saat boyunca onları takip ettik lakin nihayetinde rotamızı doğuya çevirip geri dönmek zorunda kaldık. Üstelik henüz görsel bir temas sağlayamamıştık bile. Dönüş Yolu boyunca bize balık bulma umudu ile eşlik eden bir kaç yunus ve yelkovandan başka yalnızlığımıza ortak olan çıkmadı.

Bugün, uzun balinaların en son gördüğünü yere varıyoruz. Bize şans dileyin, umalım ki bu sefer onları bir araştırmacının gözünden belgeleyebilme fırsatımız olsun.
Read more about our Giant Guardians of the Deep Seas Project here!
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