Meet the New England team working to rescue the seals

BLOCK ISLAND, R.I. — The Mystic Aquarium Animal Rescue Team has never been busier.

BLOCK ISLAND, R.I. — The Mystic Aquarium Animal Rescue Team has never been busier.

Looking through binoculars, program manager Sarah Callan scanned the shoreline for a growing problem on Block Island — entangled seals.

When fishing gear, garbage or a balloon gets wrapped around a gray seal’s neck, it tightens as the marine mammal — which can exceed 800 pounds — grows and lead to significant injury or death.

Twenty entangled gray seals have been reported to the Connecticut-based nonprofit organization so far this year; that is more than what it typically documents in a full year.

Callan called the spike “alarming.”

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/animal-news/seal-rescue-new-england-rcna204296

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