Expert brands rescue of Timmy the whale ‘an all-round catastrophe’ over deficient tracker

Marine biologists and whale experts have stepped up their criticism of a privately funded operation to release a humpback whale that was stranded for weeks off Germany’s Baltic Coast after it emerged that a tracker fitted to the whale was not working. The whereabouts and health of the young male whale – nicknamed Timmy after one of the sandbanks that it was stranded on – remain unknown three days after it was transported in a water-holding barge pulled by a tugboat to waters off the coast of Denmark. The rescue initiative, estimated to have cost about €1.5m , was funded in part by Karin Walter-Mommert, the owner of one of the largest racehorse portfolios in Europe . Walter-Mommert, who confirmed to German media on Tuesday that the tracker was not working, had previously claimed that device was also supposed to transmit information on the animal’s vital signs. This was disputed by some experts and environmental activists, including Greenpeace. The whale was first spotted stuck on a sandbank on 23 March near the city of Lübeck , on Germany’s Baltic Sea coast, before freeing itself and then becoming stuck again several times. The mammal’s health deteriorated as it became repeatedly stranded in shallow waters near the coastal city of Wismar, and unsuccessful efforts to coax it toward deeper seas were livestreamed across the globe. …