A humpback whale is still stuck in a net in Sydney Harbour, after rescuers were forced to abandon a rescue mission to free the whale.
The whale was first spotted about 1:20pm off Shark Island in the eastern harbour near Rose Bay.
It is believed the whale’s fins became hooked in a net.
Rescuers attached several orange marine buoys to the net, in the hopes of slowing the whale down so it could be unsnared.
The whale was seen breaching several times as volunteer rescuers attempted to draw near.
The rescuers had to abandon the operation for the night as it got too dark and they were unable to cut the rope safely.
They did however put a GPS tracker on the whale and will try to track it down tomorrow to free it.
The last data from the GPS showed the whale was heading out to the ocean but then turned back around, staying within the harbour.
”It’s a really, really big dangerous job,” Orrca Rescue President Ashleigh Ryan said.
“It’s gone directly into the harbour where we can kind of keep it there and keep eyes on it.”
The whale was first seen by a whale-watching cruise, who quickly alerted volunteers from wildlife rehabilitation group ORRCA.
