20 dead dolphins washed up on the coast of Odesa region

On June 5, employees of the Tuzly Estuaries National Nature Park found dead dolphins on the coast in what was described as an unprecedented number.

According to the former director of the park, environmentalist Ivan Rusev, the sea washed up 22 dolphins in one day.

Most of them - 20 - were Azov's dolphins, the only cetacean in the Sea of Azov listed in the Red Book of Ukraine. The sea also threw up one bottlenose dolphin and one white-footed dolphin.

Ivan Rusev emphasized that there may be more dolphins, as ecologists have surveyed only 25 kilometers of the National Park's coast, not the entire coast of Odesa region. According to the ecologist, in late May and early June, dolphin deaths and dumping of dolphin bodies were recorded on the Romanian and Bulgarian coasts of the Black Sea. In addition, the animals were again found alive but severely injured in the Gulf of Odesa.

"Such a catastrophic scale is a direct reference to the black year of 2022, when the largest wave of marine mammal strandings began. Due to the full-scale and barbaric war that Russia has unleashed against Ukraine and against our entire environment, the Black Sea ecosystem is on the verge of collapse. The constant, deadly military pressure - explosions, missile launches, the use of powerful sonar from ships - is destroying biodiversity," he said.

Ivan Rusev noted that the death of dolphins is caused by a combination of factors that have become part of the war:

• Chemical terror - toxic fuel oil hepatitis, pancreatitis and nephritis due to oil spills.
• Acoustic terror - sonars and explosions, Kalibr missile launches disoriented animals and traps them on the polluted coast. And some bodies or shell-shocked dolphins are being carried by the current to the seas of Odesa region and the national park.

Earlier, employees of the Tuzly Estuaries National Nature Park found four dead dolphins on the coast and two more outside the national park within a week. Prior to that, the last massive death of dolphins was observed in the summer of 2025.

Кирило Бойко