Dolphin found stranded on Avalon, NJ beach on Sunday

🔴The dolphin was found Sunday afternoon on the 71st Street beach in Avalon

🔴A necropsy has not been completed on the dolphin

🔴A Pentagon report says wind projects are "highly problematic" to military projects

AVALON — A dolphin was found on a beach in Avalon, the second within the past seven days in New Jersey.

Police Chief Jeff Christopher told New Jersey 101.5 the dolphin was discovered Sunday in the area of 71st Street in Avalon at about 2:40 p.m. Christopher said the stranding center was going to conduct an exam of the dolphin on Monday and then it would be removed from the beach.

On Feb. 27, a male bottlenose dolphin was found dead on the 50th Street Beach in Avalon. A preliminary necropsy performed by the Marine Mammal Stranding Center indicated it had pneumonia and necrosis of the lungs. A final result is pending.

A dolphin was found Wednesday washed up near the Oceanic Bridge in Middletown.

Offshore wind projects a threat to national security?

U.S. Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-N.J. 2nd District, who has been calling for a temporary halt to work on wind energy projects to study if they are contributing to the deaths of whales and dolphins, took it a step further and called them a threat to national security, citing a Pentagon report.

Bloomberg reported Monday that wind projects along the central Atlantic coast in North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland and Delaware are "highly problematic" because they are in conflict with military operations.

"These warnings can no longer be ignored. This President and this administration continue to disregard these valid concerns, and now the Pentagon is reiterating the potential impacts the industrialization of our coast will have on our national security. We need to put America first and we need a moratorium on these projects until it is far too late," Van Drew said in a statement.

Gov. Phil Murphy has said numerous times there is no connection between wind energy projects and accused those supporting a moratorium on such projects of spreading misinformation.

He posted a report by the Rutgers Offshore Wind Energy Collaborative which states that most reports are too quick to assign the cause of whale strandings without much concern for data and scientific input.

At least 16 whales and two porpoises have been found stranded on New Jersey and New York beaches since December.

Dan Alexander is a reporter for New Jersey 101.5. You can reach him at dan.alexander@townsquaremedia.com

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