(CNN) – It was one of the videos that went viral during the first exclusion of 2020, and woke everyone up when they sat at home: a dolphin swimming near the surface in a Venetian canal.
It was, of course, false – it appears to have been shot near the port of Cagliari, on the island of Sardinia.
But on Monday, two dolphins really undertook a day trip to Venice.
They sailed up the famous Grand Canal before swimming across to the island of Giudecca, where they saw no less than two churches by Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio, before returning to the Adriatic Sea.
Their visit took place when the city was in another exclusion, while Italy was fighting a third wave of Covid-19.
And while they were in danger during their time in the city, it is believed that the dolphins took it out safely.
An hour later, they appear at the mouth of the Grand Canal and swim up the iconic waterway in the direction of the famous Salute Church, where the Busetto team – who have now parked to start work – clocked them again.
“But they were also in great danger because of all the boats going back and forth, which could have injured them with their propellers.” The group tried to stop traffic while waiting for the police.
The rescue mission
The CERT team searches for the dolphins in the lagoon in Venice.
CERT
“The traffic was intense, and we realized that the dolphins were completely disoriented and swam around in all directions, mostly because they were scared,” Guido Pietroluongo of the group told CNN.
“Dolphins orient themselves mostly by sound, but here both sides of the canal have walls and there were boats all over. Authorities said they were trapped there for two hours, swimming around and around.”
And so to the rescue. The CERT team – led by Professor Sandro Mazzariol – coordinated nine boats of the Venetian authorities in a chain and tried to send the animals to the Lido, the long strip of Venice, and a point where the Venetian lagoon meet the Adriatic Sea. It took two and a half hours.
“Time and time again, a ferry would cut through the chain so that the dolphins would get lost again,” says Pietroluongo.
Eventually, with other traffic diverting, the ‘chain’ worked, and the dolphins turned their backs on St Mark’s Square, in the direction of the Lido.
“We realized that the animals were at the safest point and wanted to see what they would do,” says Pietroluongo.
“We saw them three times and then lost them completely. They have not yet returned to the Grand Canal, so hopefully they have headed in the right direction. ‘
They are believed to have returned safely to the Adriatic Sea.
The CERT team was ready to be recalled on Tuesday, but there were no observations yet.
“Hopefully they are free in their area now,” he says.
A rare observation
The couple swims past the back of the famous Salute Church.
CERT
Striped dolphins – as the CERT team believes they watched the footage – are a rare sighting in the northern Adriatic. Deep-water mammals are commonly found in the Tyrrhenian and Ionian seas, and in the southern half of the Adriatic Sea, says Pietroluongo. What’s more, they usually swim in pools of up to 100, not pairs, and stay far from the shoreline. The last time one was seen in the Venetian lagoon was four years ago; bottlenose dolphins are frequently seen.
The group thinks that this couple may have lost their way while searching for food. “They could have followed prey in the middle of the Adriatic Sea, pushed north and suddenly found themselves in Venice,” he says.
Or who knows – maybe they also wanted to see a chance to see the empty, cordoned-off city that did the rounds again on social media.
Pietroluongo calls the observation ‘joyful’. Meanwhile, Luca Folin, who shot the video of the creatures in the Grand Canal, calls it a ‘beautiful and rare moment … at a sad time’.
“I posted it on social media without thinking it would fill the world,” he says.
“In fact, I posted it to give a nice greeting to my fellow citizens in such a sad year – but that the video is viral is nice, because it means I made others smile.”