A struggling five-foot-long dolphin that beached on the Solai Nagar coast near here on Saturday evening, was declared dead later in the night.
A team from the Department of Forests which transported the dolphin to the Veterinary Hospital here, could not save the life of the mammal.
The dolphin was declared dead at around 7.30 p.m.
Fishermen first sighted the struggling creature at around 5 p.m. as it lay wedged in the rocks close to the coastline.
The fishermen initially tried to get it on a boat and ease it back into the sea but failed. They then brought it back to the shore and alerted the forest department.
However, personnel from the Forest Department took over an hour to arrive. During this period, fishermen kept pouring water on the dolphin to keep it moist.
By then, news of dolphin stranded on the coast attracted huge crowds to the beach.
Deputy Conservator of Forests P. Sathyamoorthy said that the dolphin was probably a female and weighed around 200 kg. A post-mortem would be done to ascertain the cause of death, he said.
