Latest news with #entanglement
CBS News
04-07-2025
- General
- CBS News
Manatee rescued from fishing line entanglement by Florida Keys team during multi-day mission
A manatee is safely back in the water after one of its front flippers was severely entangled in a fishing line in the Florida Keys last week. On Saturday, the Dolphin Research Center (DRC) led a complex rescue of an injured manatee in close coordination with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) and Dolphins Plus. According to the organization, Cooley's rescue took multiple days and required "many hours" of careful effort to safely free her. Dolphin Research Center The manatee, known as "Cooley," was found "suffering from a severe entanglement caused by fishing line wrapped tightly around her pectoral flipper," the DRC said. According to the organization, Cooley's rescue took multiple days and required "many hours" of careful effort to safely free her. Once disentangled, Cool was treated on-site by Dr. Scott Gearhart, the DRC's veterinarian. After a thorough evaluation and treatment at the rescue location, she was immediately released back into her natural habitat. According to the DRC, Cooley's rescue highlighted a "trouble, ongoing issue": She has been rescued multiple times in her life due to similar entanglement injuries. Additionally, her mother "Dually" — another manatee well-known by the DRC — has also been rescued over a dozen times over the years for the same hazard, the organization said. "This isn't just a one-time issue — it's an ongoing and serious threat to manatees in [Florida] waters," said Allie Proskovec, the public relations director for the DRC. "When the same animals are needing rescue again and again, it shows how urgent it is for all of us to take better care of our environment." According to the DRC, the organization is the only licensed manatee rescue team in the Florida Keys and plays "a critical role in responding to these emergencies and providing expert care for injured wildlife." "Fishing line entanglements remain one of the most common and preventable dangers faced by manatees," the organization said. "DRC urges anglers and the public to properly dispose of fishing line using designated recycling bins and to report injured wildlife immediately to the FWC." The DRC advises that if anyone spots a manatee that may be injured, entangled or in distress, to call the FWC Wildlife Alert Hotline at 1 (888) 404-FWCC (3922). If you want to learn more about the DRC or support its conservation efforts, visit or visit their Facebook and Instagram pages.
Yahoo
26-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Rare photos capture incredible rescue off Australian coast
A mission to save an entangled whale off Australia's east coast has been captured in a series of rare aerial photographs. They were snapped this week as a multi-agency team worked to free the giant mammal as it swam along the NSW Central Coast. Ordinarily, flying a drone within 100 metres of a whale would be illegal because the disturbance can interfere with their migration. But because it was difficult to assess the whale's condition at sea, an exemption was made for a skilled operator from rescue group ORRCA to snap close-up pictures. Images were first taken on Monday so the project's leader, National Parks and Wildlife Service, could assess the entanglement and formulate a plan about how they'd need to manoeuvre around the whale and cut the ropes. 'Then every time they'd do a cut, I'd relay some images back to them to show the changes in the entanglement,' the ORRCA drone pilot told Yahoo News. It was Sunday afternoon when reports from the public were first received about the juvenile humpback being entangled in fishing gear off Sydney's northern beaches. With light fading fast, a decision was made to halt rescue attempts until first light. On Monday, the whale was spotted swimming further north through Pittwater, towards Broken Bay and Umina. NSW Water Police and Marine Rescue NSW monitored the situation from their vessels as teams of rescuers worked to free the struggling animal from a web of buoys and rope. 'The entanglement was around its body, around its tail, around one of its [pectoral fins] as well. Because the mammal was in distress, it was acting quite aggressively,' the drone operator said. 'I didn't know what was actually going on.' 📸 Photo of elusive whale off Aussie coast reveals incredible feat 🚨 Alarming map highlights growing threats to migrating whales 🌊 Carloads of Aussies flock to water's edge as 'exciting' ancient ritual begins Remarkably, as the rescue continued over the next four to five hours, the drone pilot noticed the whale's behaviour was changing. 'It was interesting to watch as the hours unfolded. When they did the first cut, it splashed its tail quite aggressively. But over time, it seemed to realise the rescuers were there to help. At one point, it was just staying in one spot, not moving at all, allowing the boats to come close and move the rope away.' When ropes and nets aren't quickly removed, they can cut into whale flesh or even sever their fins. Because the entanglement was relatively fresh, there wasn't any visible damage to the humpback. Rescuers were unable to remove two small pieces of rope from its body, but they're confident they'll fall off. Fishing net entanglement is a growing problem for whales as they migrate up Australia's coastline. There were two other humpback whales freed from entanglements off the NSW coast earlier this month. In Queensland, they face the added threat of shark nets, which are left to dangle precariously in waters throughout the year, regularly catching inexperienced calves or their mothers as they come in close to shore. In NSW, they are removed during the winter. This Sunday, ORRCA will be hosting its 26th Annual Whale Census, an event where everyday Aussies are urged to head to the beach to witness the annual humpback migration. An estimated 40,000 whales are expected to migrate up the east coast this year. Anyone wishing to participate in the count is asked to register on ORRCA's website and download the app. Love Australia's weird and wonderful environment? 🐊🦘😳 Get our new newsletter showcasing the week's best stories.
Yahoo
23-06-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Quantum embezzlement: An entanglement trick once thought impossible exists for real
In quantum physics, entanglement links particles across space in ways that defy logic. However, there's a lesser-known phenomenon that's even more intriguing than entanglement, and it's called quantum embezzlement. It happens when one system quietly supplies entanglement to another system, helping the latter change its state, without being affected itself. It's a bit like quietly borrowing a few grains of sand from a vast beach to build a tiny sandcastle. The beach looks untouched, yet the sand is used. For years, scientists thought such perfectly entangled systems existed only in theory. However, a new study from researchers at Leibniz University Hannover in Germany shows that embezzlement can occur naturally in a class of quantum materials called critical fermion chains. Critical fermion chains are one-dimensional systems made of fermions (a type of subatomic particle) that sit at the transition point between two phases. At this point, they become highly sensitive and exhibit long-range quantum entanglement. The discovery of embezzlement in a real physical system like critical fermion chains is of great importance as it can contribute to the development of robust technologies that rely on entanglement and involve large-scale quantum information transfer. So what makes quantum embezzlement so strange? Well, normally, when you use a resource in quantum physics, like a highly entangled system, you expect its state to change. However, with embezzlement, it's like using a magic battery that powers a process without ever draining. For this to work, the resource must be very entangled, so much so that many scientists doubted such a system could physically exist. It seemed too ideal to be real. Moreover, the embezzlement here is universal, meaning that the resource system can help create any entangled state, not just specific ones. It works in many different situations, not just for one special case. The study authors decided to investigate whether this universal embezzlement could actually occur in real, physical systems. They started by focusing on critical fermion chains, and instead of working with small, manageable systems, the researchers looked directly at infinite systems, using what physicists call the thermodynamic limit. In this setup, they split the system into a left and right half and studied the entanglement between them. Surprisingly, they found that these half-chains satisfied the strict criteria for universal embezzlement that the team had defined in earlier work. In simple terms, the left and right sides were entangled enough to act like perfect embezzlers. The researchers were able to assist in entangling other systems. Even more impressively, the team showed that this effect wasn't just an unusual property of infinite systems. When they looked at large but finite fermion chains, systems that could potentially be built in a lab, scientists still found strong evidence of approximate embezzlement. That means this isn't just a theoretical phenomenon. Real materials might already be doing this under the right conditions. "Finally, we demonstrate that the universal embezzlement property is not exclusive to the thermodynamic limit, but that it already emerges in large but finite fermion systems," Lauritz van Luijk, first author of the study, and a physicist at the Leibniz University Hannover, said. This discovery rewrites the rules about how entanglement can behave in physical systems. It shows that quantum embezzlement is not a fragile or exotic phenomenon, but a robust property occurring in real systems. In the future, this could help scientists discover new ways to transfer entanglement in quantum computers, improve methods of simulating quantum materials, or even new states of matter. However, the work so far is entirely theoretical. "While our work shows that critical spin chains can embezzle entanglement, it does not provide a recipe for how to do so," Luijk said. The research doesn't offer a way to actually perform embezzlement in practice. The study authors are now working on protocols using Gaussian operations, a type of quantum operation that's easier to implement with current technology. They hope these protocols might help them turn embezzlement from theory into something experimentally achievable. The study is published in the journal Nature Physics.
CTV News
17-06-2025
- General
- CTV News
Entangled North Atlantic right whale spotted near P.E.I.
An entangled North Atlantic right whale that was last seen in the St. Lawrence Estuary has been re-sighted near Prince Edward Island. Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) says officials saw the whale (named #5132) near Morell in the Gulf of St. Lawrence on Monday. The whale was last seen near Les Escoumins, Que., on May 27. The whale is a juvenile male that was born in 2021. It was first seen entangled near North Carolina last December. 'If the whale is located again, and weather and sea conditions allow, efforts will be made to attempt disentanglement by our Marine Mammal Response partner the Campobello Whale Rescue Team,' the DFO said in a news release. 'We ask the public not to approach a rescue effort, should you see one underway. Keep your distance. Responding to an entanglement is dangerous, and our partners need space and time to safely do their work.' There are an estimated 370 North Atlantic right whales alive today. For more P.E.I. news, visit our dedicated provincial page.
The Guardian
09-06-2025
- General
- The Guardian
Search continues for humpback whale entangled in drum line off Sydney's coast
Rescuers are continuing their search for a humpback whale that was spotted entangled in a drum line off Sydney's coast and appeared to be moving south, but authorities also say the mammal may free itself. The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) had been tracking the eight-metre whale after its pectoral fin was seen entangled 1km off the coast of Newcastle on Saturday. The whale appeared to resurface off the northern beaches in Sydney on Sunday, and then disappeared from sight while swimming around the south head of Sydney. 'Given the nature of the entanglement, the animal may disentangle itself,' a spokesperson for NPWS said. Vanessa Pirotta, a wildlife scientist, said it's not yet clear what the drum line which the whale is entangled in was used for. Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email Drum lines, which have fishing lines attached to a buoy, can be used for fishing or to catch and divert sharks away from popular swimming areas. She said it's also unclear if the whale – which should be heading north as part of its migration pattern – had swum south due to distress caused by the entanglement. The annual procession of thousands of whales that migrate from Antarctic feeding grounds to tropical breeding areas along Australia's east and west coasts began this month. 'Animal behaviour is unpredictable, and it's hard to tell how long it has been entangled for,' Pirotta said. 'Looking for an entangled whale is like looking for a needle in a hay stack. It may be the size of a bus, but the ocean is a big place.' The Organisation for the Rescue and Research of Cetaceans (Orrca) believed the whale was travelling south on Monday, but the animal's movements and difficult weather conditions had made tracking it more difficult. Pip Jacobs, a spokesperson for Orrca, said the whale's speed had been erratic, possibly because it is stressed. 'We have Orrca members who are in this area attempting to relocate the whale this morning (by drone and from land), however predicted strong winds may make this difficult,' she said. It is calling for New South Wales residents to keep an eye on the waves today to help track the whale. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion Orrca and the NPWS were working alongside the Department of Primary Industry Fisheries and NSW Marine Rescue to track the whale. 'The NPWS has Large Whale Disentanglement teams on standby to respond if the animal is sighted, however sea conditions will be a consideration in whether or not it is safe to attempt a disentanglement if required,' a spokesperson said. 'NPWS reminds people that for their own safety, as well as the safety of this animal, there is a 100-metre exclusion zone for recreational vehicles on water and drones in the air.' Once hunted to near extinction, the humpback whale– Megaptera novaeangliae – have made a remarkable recovery. The whales are no longer considered threatened and population estimates now range between a healthy 30,000 to 50,000. Animals Australia has been calling for the end of the use drum lines alongside shark nets arguing they threaten marine life. The group has been urging the government to instead implement measures to protect beach-goers that are 'non-lethal' to marine wildlife. Orrca are urging anyone who spots the whale to call its 24/7 rescue hotline on (02) 9415 3333.
