A bunch of beachgoers in Argentina last week inadvertently killed an endangered baby dolphin when they scooped it out of the ocean and started taking pictures of it.
Vida Silvestra, the local arm of the World Wildlife Fund, claims that tourists in the town of Santa Teresita found the dolphin in the ocean and brought it ashore, passed around the smartphone-brandishing crowd. It later died. The dolphin was a Franciscana dolphin, which is a species that gets particularly weak when removed from the water from extended periods.
The diminutive dolphin species grows to be slightly longer than five feet long, and it’s classified as “vulnerable.” According to Vida Silvestre, there are fewer than 30,000 individuals in the wild. The organisation claims that it’s unlikely the species will recover.
Put the dolphin back in the water. The selfie’s not worth it.
[Vida Silvestre via Ubergizmo]