Thousands of Black Sea dolphins have died as a result of the war in Ukraine

Black Sea dolphins are one of the many unseen casualties of war in Ukraine and thousands have been found dead since the conflict began. The reasons behind their deaths are complicated, but one dedicated biologist has been working to reveal the cost of Russia's war on the country's wildlife populations.

Ivan Rusev is the head of Ukraine's Research Department of the Tuzly Estuaries National Park, and at the beginning of May, he posted on Facebook about the tragic loss of another 100 Black Sea dolphins in the previous month.

Photo by Facebook @rusevivan

"Unfortunately, during April 2023, more than a hundred dead dolphins have already been registered in the bays of Sevastopol and other shores of the occupied Crimea and nearby Novorossyska, Sochi, Gelendzhik," Rusev wrote according to a USA Today translation.

"This is confirmation of the fact that the activity of hostile submarines and submarines in that part of the Black Sea near Crimea and Novorossiysk is a major factor in the continuation of the deaths of rare Black Sea animals," Rusev wrote in a Facebook post.

This isn't the first time Rusev has sounded the alarm on what's happening to the Black Sea's dolphin population. In August of 2022 the Ukranian biologist said that he was worried up to 5000 dolphins had already died as a result of the conflict.

“I have never seen this before," Rusev told the Kyiv Independent’s Natalia Datskevych, "this is something absolutely new and terrifying for scientists.” 

Photo by Facebook @rusevivan

Rusev blamed Russian ships and submarines stationed in the Black Sea for the deaths, claiming that their sonar was affecting the health of the animals. 

“Dolphins fall into the radiation zone of ships' navigation devices, which disables their organs of navigation and echolocation,” Rusev wrote in a Facebook post. 

Sonar is particularly dangerous for mammals like dolphins because they rely on underwater sound for navigation, catching prey, and communicating with the rest of their pod. 

Military sonar like Low-Frequency Active Sonar (LFA) generates rolling sound waves that can travel for hundreds of miles underwater and can lead to injury and death in some animals. 

“LFA sonar can harm the animals by interrupting mating, stopping communication, causing them to separate from calves, and inflicting stress,” according to The Verge's Alessandra Potenza. 

Rusev claimed that the sonar being used by Russian naval forces was damaging the acoustic systems of the dolphins in the Black Sea, effectively blinding them and preventing them from eating.  

“They couldn’t orient themselves in the sea and catch fish,” Rusev said, “therefore every day they lost weight and their immune system weakened. 

Rusev has also noted that both mines and underwater explosions are adding to the dolphin death toll and creating an environmental catastrophe for the marine life living on Ukraine’s Black Sea coast. 

For 40 years Rusev has monitored Ukraine’s coasts and he’s never seen anything like the death and destruction since the beginning of Russia’s invasion. 

“In total, we estimate that a minimum of 50,000 dolphins have died and a maximum of 100,000,” Rusev said during a video interview with Radio Free Europe. 

According to Ukraine’s Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources, there are only about 253,000 dolphins living in the Black Sea.

If Rusev's estimates from August were true, it could mean that more than one-third of the Black Sea's dolphin population may have died, and many more lost their lives since he made that statement. 

During his interview with Radio Free Europe, Rusev said that he had just found 12 dead dolphins and noted that prior to Russia’s invasion, he had never found a single dolphin corpse on that part of Ukraine’s coastline, a worrying sign as Russia’s war drags on.