News Dolphins attacking beachgoers in Fukui

This is the second year in a row that dolphins have injured humans at Fukui prefecture beaches on the Sea of Japan coast. Last summer, at least six people were bitten by a single animal — thought to be an Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops aduncus) — with the most serious case requiring 14 stitches to close a gash at the base of the victim's thumb, according to the Japanese news site The Mainichi. This year and last, dolphins came right up to the water's edge. The man whose ribs splintered had been swimming five metres from the shore at Suishohama Beach when a dolphin rammed and bit him, and local police told the Asahi Shimbun news site in Japan. Another man sustained bites on his left arm the same morning, and the BBC reported that two more beachgoers were attacked later that day, although there are few details about these incidents.

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Tadamichi Morisaka, a cetology professor at Japan's Mie University, said [...] it is reasonable to assume that it is the same individual, as the wounds on the tail fin are similar to those of the dolphins seen off the coast last year, and it is rare for dolphins, which normally move in groups, to be alone for such a long time." He added that male bottlenose dolphins communicate by "play-biting each other". "They are not trying to injure people, but are using the dolphins' way of communication with people," he said. Others have suggested various theories on why the same creature may be behind these attacks - including a desire for sex.

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Dr Matthias Hoffmann-Kuhnt, a marine mammal expert at the National University of Singapore, said the dolphin could also be acting in its own defence. "Most of the time, in my experience, this is more a defensive behaviour when humans get to close to these dolphins and do not know how to conduct themselves," he said, referring to reports of people trying to ride the animals or sticking their fingers into the dolphins' blowholes. "Thus it is no wonder that the animals then turn aggressive or at least protective against humans in the water," he said.

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