science · 12 December 2006 · 18 years ago
In 2006, the Baiji Yangtze freshwater dolphin was presumed functionally extinct when a search expedition ended an intense six-week search for the animal without any results. Scientists from six nations had travelled along the heavily polluted Yangtze River of China on two research ships almost 3,500-km from Yichang near the Three Gorges Dam to Shanghai into the Yangtze Delta and back. However, their high-performance optical instruments and underwater microphones detected no signs of the creature. The Baiji is the first large mammal brought to extinction due to human destruction of its habitat. From around 400 Baiji known in the early 1980's, numbers declined to 13 sightings in 1997, and none seen since Sep 2004.
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