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The more you know...
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You've likely heard of the Navy SEAL dog that took part in the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden. Now meet the other Navy seals. Actually, they're sea lions. And dolphins.
For more than five decades, the Navy has enlisted sea lions, dolphins, and other marine mammals as an elite corps of underwater sentries, searchers, and mine-sweepers. Its Marine Mammal Program started in 1960 when weapons researchers studied a Pacific white-sided dolphin named Notty to see if she might teach them something about designing speedier torpedoes. She didn't, but the service has remained intriguiged by sea mammals' speed, stealth, sonar, and smarts. During the Vietnam War, specially trained dolphins were deployed to protect ships in Cam Ranh Bay. The Navy denies that they were dispatched to kill enemy divers as part of a "swimmer nullification program", though more recently sea lions have been trained to "attach restraint devices to swimmers." (The notion of dolphins as trained killers inspired The Day of the Dolphin, a 1973 movie starring George C. Scott.) Since the mid-1970s, the program has expanded to include beluga whales, seals, and and killer whales, though bottlenose dolphins and Californa sea lions have become its two mainstays due to their "their trainability, adaptability, and heartiness in the marine environment."
-- LJ/Mother Jones
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I half-expect to have to delete this later because they are pulling my leg.
_ _ _
You've likely heard of the Navy SEAL dog that took part in the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden. Now meet the other Navy seals. Actually, they're sea lions. And dolphins.
For more than five decades, the Navy has enlisted sea lions, dolphins, and other marine mammals as an elite corps of underwater sentries, searchers, and mine-sweepers. Its Marine Mammal Program started in 1960 when weapons researchers studied a Pacific white-sided dolphin named Notty to see if she might teach them something about designing speedier torpedoes. She didn't, but the service has remained intriguiged by sea mammals' speed, stealth, sonar, and smarts. During the Vietnam War, specially trained dolphins were deployed to protect ships in Cam Ranh Bay. The Navy denies that they were dispatched to kill enemy divers as part of a "swimmer nullification program", though more recently sea lions have been trained to "attach restraint devices to swimmers." (The notion of dolphins as trained killers inspired The Day of the Dolphin, a 1973 movie starring George C. Scott.) Since the mid-1970s, the program has expanded to include beluga whales, seals, and and killer whales, though bottlenose dolphins and Californa sea lions have become its two mainstays due to their "their trainability, adaptability, and heartiness in the marine environment."
-- LJ/Mother Jones
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I half-expect to have to delete this later because they are pulling my leg.
