DAUPHIN ISLAND — Marine mammal responders from across the northern Gulf Coast gathered Friday at Dauphin Island Sea Lab to train with newly acquired whale flotation pontoons, specialized equipment designed to help support and refloat stranded whales in the water.

The training marked the first time the equipment has been available in the Southeast. Developed by British Divers Marine Life Rescue, a United Kingdom charity that trains marine mammal responders and maintains whale rescue systems around the UK, the pontoons are based on a design first created in New Zealand. Inflatable air chambers are positioned beneath a stranded whale to support its body weight and help keep the animal upright and buoyant during rescue efforts.

The equipment was funded through the

National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. Four organizations received two pontoons each for regional response efforts: Dauphin Island Sea Lab, Mote Marine Laboratory, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and Texas Marine Mammal Stranding Network.

Personnel from the Alabama Marine Mammal Stranding Network, Dauphin Island Sea Lab and partners from Louisiana took part in the hands-on training, which was led by British Divers Marine Life Rescue instructors James Barnett and Martin "Boony" Boon.

"I thought this was super successful," said Mackenzie Russell, stranding programs manager for the Alabama Marine Mammal Stranding Network. "We are super prepared is a good word for it. We want to always be the most prepared that we can be."

Russell said the sea lab's role as host site for the equipment strengthens existing partnerships throughout the Gulf.

"Having the sea lab be the host of these for the whole northern Gulf is a wonderful use of our facilities and our training, as well as our partnerships and collaborative collaborations," she said. "Having our folks come from Louisiana, that was huge. Following up later, hopefully we'll do trainings with Mississippi and the Panhandle."

Before the arrival of the pontoons, responders in the region relied primarily on straps and other equipment stored in large whale caches. Russell said the lack of flotation devices was evident during a 2020 sperm whale stranding in Alabama.

"We didn't have anything in this area to be able to support that physically in the water," she said.

Ruth Carmichael, senior marine scientist at Dauphin Island Sea Lab and professor at the University of South Alabama, said the sea lab's location and existing partnerships made it a natural choice to house the equipment.

"We have a strategic location, a critical mass of resources here, and we do have great relationships with the network and with our state partners and the other states that we already work closely with," Carmichael said. "I think it's great. It's an honor that the state of Alabama and the Dauphin Island Sea Lab were selected, have the opportunity to host it, but it's also something we don't take lightly."

She said marine mammal strandings have always required a broad community effort.

"People rally together, people care about these animals, and they care about our natural resources," Carmichael said. "It takes a village, and so we definitely historically have relied on that kind of support from the network and from the community when we just needed manpower and figured things out.

"This is just one more tool that we'll have in our toolbox that'll just make things easier, easier for us, and also hopefully easier on the animal to ultimately result in a better prognosis for what may come next."

Although neither Russell nor Carmichael hopes the equipment will ever be needed, both said Friday's training left them confident.

"I don't want it to happen," Russell said, "but I think we'll be prepared if it does."

"Today, I feel really ready," Carmichael said. 

Gabriella Chavez is a Report for America corps member who writes about growth and development in Baldwin County and our natural spaces for Gulf Coast Media. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep her writing stories like this one; please consider making a tax-deductible gift of any amount today by visiting https://tinyurl.com/yaf8yf5n.