A Russian spy whale swims in Scandinavian waters

A collared polar beluga whale was spotted in the territorial waters of the Northern European countries. Local authorities believe that this is a Russian spy whale. On the ego collar there is an inscription “Petersburg 2019 equipment”.

On Sunday, a beluga was spotted in the territorial waters of Sweden, not far from its southwestern coast.

According to Swedish zoologists, the south of Sweden is too warm for belugas, they usually live closer to the Arctic Circle. Specialists believe that the whale swam to the south in search of a mate or company, since belugas are a very social species.

This is not the first appearance of a beluga in the waters of Scandinavia, it managed to become a local celebrity. The whale was first spotted in Norway in April 2019. His collar was equipped with mounts for video cameras. The whale was trained to follow ships. Presumably, he could escape from the military training base or be released “on assignment”, but lose the video cameras on the way.

The local press wrote a lot about the animal. He was nicknamed Khvaldymir – from the Novyzh word hval (whale) and the name of the Russian president Vladimir. Now Khvaldymir is about 14 years old. Zoologists claim that he is not afraid of sea vessels and is friendly to people: apparently, he had previously communicated a lot with people and was trained.

• In the 1980s, the Soviet Army developed a program to train dolphins to detect underwater mines. This program was closed in the 1990s. In 2017, the Russian state television channel “Zvezda” reported on a program of training beluga whales, seals and dolphins for military use.