Volunteers race to save hundreds of beached whales

Volunteers are racing to save surviving whales after 400 of them swam aground on a remote New Zealand beach.

About three-quarters of the pilot whales were already dead when Cheree Morrison and two colleagues found them Friday at the tip of the South Island.

Within hours, hundreds of farmers, tourists and teenagers were helping to keep the surviving 100 or so whales alive in one of the worst whale strandings in the nation's history.

Ms Morrison, a magazine writer and editor, found the whales after taking a pre-dawn trip with a photographer and a guide to capture the sunrise.

She said: "You could hear the sounds of splashing, of blowholes being cleared, of sighing. The young ones were the worst. Crying is the only way to describe it.

"It was just heartbreaking. Utterly heartbreaking."

The adult and baby whale carcasses were strewn three or four deep in places for hundreds of yards, often rolled over on the sand with their tail fins still aloft.

Morrison's group alerted authorities, and volunteers arrived in wetsuits and carrying buckets.

Ms Morrison told how she waded into the water and did what she could to try to maneuver the surviving whales upright so they could breathe more easily.

She added: "I walked away crying my eyes out. We knew there were limited things we could do."

When high tide came, volunteers did manage to refloat several dozen of the surviving whales, while others remained beached.

The volunteers then formed a human chain in the water to try to stop the creatures from swimming back and stranding themselves again. It will likely take a day or so to determine how successful their efforts have been.

Farewell Spit, a sliver of sand that arches like a hook into the Tasman Sea, seems to confuse whales and has been the site of previous mass strandings.

Department of Conservation community ranger Kath Inwood said about 300 volunteers had joined conservation workers on the beach.

She said the volunteers were continuing to keep the stranded survivors damp and cool by placing blankets over them and dousing them with buckets of water.

The volunteers will have to wait until the next daylight high tide on Saturday to try to refloat more of the whales, including any that strand themselves again.