Can a whale drown?

Answer

Whales are mammals, they breathe through lungs, not gills like fish. Whales and dolphins therefore have to surface regularly to breathe fresh air. For example, when whales get entangled in a fishing net, they can’t come up to breathe and they can indeed drown.

There are many small dolphins on the Belgian coast: porpoises. All porpoises that wash up on our beaches (about 60 per year) are scientifically examined, so that we can determine the cause of death. In many cases, the porpoises have died because they drowned in fishing nets.