Animaniacs Pinky and the Brain Detention Histeria! Superman: The Animated Series. DC Comics. Explore Wikis Community Central. Register Don't have an account? Winter dolphin. History Talk 0. Universal Conquest Wiki. The facility was closed on Friday, in part to mourn the loss of its most famous resident, but it reopened on Saturday.
Fans, including autistic children and soldiers with missing limbs, made pilgrimages to visit Winter, star of the film Dolphin Tale, which chronicled her recovery. While Winter might have survived without one, using her side flippers to swim, that would have led to skeletal misalignment and other health issues.
Necrosis ate away at her tail; her survival was uncertain. But she gained weight by sucking fish smoothies out of Dasani bottles, relearned to swim and eventually moved in with an older dolphin, Panama, who became an adoptive mother to Winter before dying in , at around age The first few years of her life were chronicled in a St.
Yates had already been pitching a movie about Winter for years. Winter would appear as herself, with help from computer graphics and animatronics. And the film would be shot in Pinellas County. Dolphin Tale , which later spawned a sequel, was a boon for the aquarium, which saw annual attendance grow from , to ,, and for Tampa Bay tourism.
Winter, though, remained herself, those close to her said over the years. She chowed pounds of capelin and silverside; she swam in her tank, sometimes without her prosthetic tail, propelling herself side-to-side like a fish, rather than up-and-down like dolphins usually do.
When Abby Stone, a longtime trainer who had worked with Winter since her arrival at the aquarium, was asked earlier this year if the dolphin was a Hollywood diva, she laughed. Auslander said Winter had contracted infections before, but that they had never been as serious. A dolphin can live to be around 28 years old in the wild, and in aquariums they are known to live longer. That was the end of one thing, and the miraculous beginning of another. The sea spit out the dying baby dolphin, cast her into a strange new world.
She would be claimed by science and claimed by children. At dawn on Dec. Only one fisherman faced the gusty chop in Mosquito Lagoon. Jim Savage thought about staying home when the cold front came through. But he pictured himself restlessly underfoot on a Saturday, aggravating his wife. Better to spend a few hours bundled up on the water. He trailered his foot flats boat to the ramp at the north end of Canaveral National Seashore.
In the lagoon, he could see a line of crab pot buoys, all tilted over with the wind. He looked again - something weird there. He motored toward it. The lagoon was just a few feet deep, but the water had churned into a brown chop. Want more of our free, weekly newsletters in your inbox? Jim pulled on the buoy and retrieved a bleeding female baby dolphin, hog-tied in the crab pot line. She looked no bigger than an armful. She squealed in pain.
Her tail looked a mess. The baby dolphin thrashed in the ropes, struggling to breathe. He figured the dolphin must have snooped the bait in the trap, tangled her tail in the rope, then tried to spin out of it. As she spun, she tried to bite through the rope. That only cinched the rope tighter, cutting into her mouth. Jim dug out his filet knife and sliced the rope into pieces.
The dolphin wriggled loose, rope embedded in her mouth. She drifted a few feet, out of reach, and stopped near the boat. Jim reached out to touch her, but she squealed and moved away. Then she stopped again. She was listing, unable to swim. She was scared of Jim, but she clearly sensed a need of him.
She seemed to be waiting for him to do something. Jim was an auto mechanic. He had never been this close to a dolphin. He would lose sight of the baby. He called an emergency number for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission.
They promised someone would come. He waited, helpless, through the morning, drifting beside the dolphin as the sun climbed. He watched the gray shape in the water, listened to her ragged breathing.
Each time he tried to touch her, the baby squealed - a shrieking whistle. Teresa Mazza was visiting friends that day in Ormond Beach, not far from Mosquito Lagoon, when she got the call. She had never been in charge of a rescue. She had no first aid kit for a bleeding dolphin. She grabbed what she had — a measuring tape and a stopwatch — and jumped in the car.
Four men in the second boat taxied her to Jim. As soon as she saw the dolphin, she kicked off her shoes and jumped overboard in her jacket and T-shirt. She felt the shock of the freezing water. The dolphin squealed and moved away.
She climbed back in the boat. They made a plan. The two boats slowly herded the dolphin toward a sandbar near the ramp, beaching it. Teresa and Jim climbed out of the boat and waded to her. Teresa got a clear view of her wounds, first the deep cuts in her mouth, then the exposed veins in her tail.
The baby trembled. She looked at Teresa, eyes wide and panicked. Teresa was sure the dolphin was dying. She lifted the baby slightly to support her organs. He could feel it hammering against the skin. They waited.
They made more cell phone calls. Teresa called her colleague and friend Claire Surrey at the wildlife commission. She came right out. Teresa and Claire took turns cradling the dolphin in their laps. Hours passed. Their hands grew numb in the water. Harbor Branch had a special ambulance for injured whales and dolphins. It dispatched the ambulance, plus a chase truck with a vet and a team of dolphin experts.
Jim and the other boaters eventually went home. The afternoon wore on. The two women sat together in the shallow water, talking little. Loud voices upset the dolphin. The baby was in obvious pain. They took turns cradling the dolphin, scooping water over her head to keep her cool. Teresa thought she would die in her arms. In the afternoon, Harbor Branch called with bad news. Its ambulance had blown a tire miles from the lagoon. The truckload of experts would continue on, but they would have to find another ambulance.
They would try SeaWorld in Orlando. About the same time, a family of dolphins appeared by the sandbar - two or three adults and several young. Teresa knew the little dolphin was critically injured. Her ragged tail had begun to turn white. This was likely her last look at Mosquito Lagoon, her last moment of freedom, even if she lived. For a crazy second, Teresa pictured the baby wriggling free, swimming off with her family. The dolphin squirmed as if aching to go.
Teresa watched them go. Even the other dolphins had given up. Animals have a way of knowing when a cause is lost. At dusk, a SeaWorld rescue van arrived. Teresa, Claire and the Harbor Branch team carried the baby ashore in a stretcher. She was headed across the state to the Clearwater Marine Aquarium. She had to catch a flight the next day to a marine science conference in San Diego.
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