Dead sardines appear on Calangute, Candolim beaches, Goa, India

April 30, 2011

The dead sardines seen on Calangute beach on Friday. (Nandesh Kambli)

PANAJI: The people of Calangute and Candolim witnessed an unusual phenomenon of dead sardines surfacing on the beaches in the area on Friday morning, sending the people in a tizzy as some of them suspected some “unnatural” happening that led to death of fish, which was washed ashore.

According to the information provided by the locals, the shack owners and the lifeguards of the Surf Life Saving Goa the dead sardines, apparently “unloaded” by some trawlers that were hovering in the area late Thursday evening, started surfacing on the beaches early on Friday morning.
As the day progressed the dead fish got accumulated in huge numbers denying the tourists and the locals the access to the sea and many tourists had to turn back to their hotels.
The locals said entire beach area from Calangute to Candolim was covered by fish up to a metre in breadth.
Though the fish had started surfacing on the beaches since morning the fisheries department officials were unaware of the situation till afternoon. According to the people of Calangute and Candolim the entire area was cleaned by workers engaged by the contractor of the tourism department and the shack owners.
Though the fish was removed from the beaches by 3.30 p.m., the stink of the fish persisted in the area till late in the evening. The stink did not deter the tourists from going to the beach and hundreds of people were seen enjoying on the beaches in the area.
 A local informed that the people first thought that the fish might have died due to release of radioactive material by some passing ship. However, this apprehension was found to have no basis as some people told the curious people that they had seen some fishing trawlers hovering around late Thursday evening and that they might have dumped the fish, which did not yield them much returns.
The director of tourism, Mr Swapnil Naik said the contractor had to deploy additional workers to clean the beach. He said the cleaning work, which began in the morning, had to be discontinued during the noon and that the entire area was cleared of the fish by 3.30 p.m.

navhindtimes.in

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