Optimism over eight whales refloated at Farewell Spit

There's no sign of eight pilot whales [https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/top/538420/eight-surviving-whales-stranded-at-farewell-spit-in-golden-bay-successfully-refloated refloated at Farewell Spit on Wednesday night, according to a spokesperson from marine rescue organisation Project Jonah.

The pod of 10 stranded on the Golden Bay beach on Tuesday.

Two of the pod died, but marine mammal medics, Department of Conservation rangers and volunteers were able to refloat the eight survivors with the high tide.

The spokesperson said checks of the area were still underway, but so far, there has been no sign of the whales.

Department of Conservation Golden Bay operations manager Ross Trotter said he was confident the whales would make a full recovery after being out of the water for almost 24 hours.

He said the Farewell Spit area was notorious for whale strandings.

"It has been going on for years. There's been a lot of theories and scientific research into it but we don't know why they [the whales] strand in the first place or why they repeat strand."

The latest stranding came after a large pod of pilot whales were stranded and refloated several times at the start of last month, with more than a dozen dying.