The Last Rescued Dolphins in Canada Just Found a Home in Spain, Thanks to a Park With a History of Showing Up
Four dolphins named Echo, Lida, Marina and Tsunami were loaded into transport slings at Marineland in Niagara Falls, Ontario, on Wednesday morning and driven to Toronto Pearson International Airport for a flight to Oceanografic Valencia in Spain. Two belugas, Cleopatra and Jelly Bean, made the journey with them. When the group landed, Canada’s last rescued dolphins had a new home, and Oceanografic had once again stepped into a role it has quietly built a reputation for: the place that says yes when animals have nowhere else to go.
The relocation is part of the largest collective move of rescued whales and dolphins on record, an effort that has been underway since mid-July to find new homes for all 30 belugas and four dolphins remaining at the now-closed Marineland. Six belugas are still at the park this week, with transport to an American aquarium expected to follow in the coming weeks.
This is not Oceanografic’s first time answering this kind of call. In 2022, the Valencia aquarium took in two belugas evacuated from a dolphinarium in Kharkiv, Ukraine, after Russian shelling near the facility put the animals in immediate danger. Daniel Garcia-Parraga, the park’s director of zoological operations, said at the time that the whales arrived in rough shape after a journey that included a border crossing aided by the European Union’s Anti-Fraud Office and a five-hour flight from Chisinau, Moldova. They adapted far better than veterinarians had dared to hope. Carlos Mazon, the regional leader of Valencia, called the rescue “a historic feat of animal protection on a global level.”
Oceanografic’s connection to Marineland itself goes back even further. In 2019, the park took in two belugas owned by Vancouver Aquarium’s parent organization, under a narrow exception written into Canada’s new export law for transfers judged to be in the whales’ direct best interest. Canada’s fisheries minister at the time, Jonathan Wilkinson, said the decision came down to simple fact: “The Spanish facility is much better equipped to take care of these whales on an ongoing basis in a manner that many of us would be comfortable with.”
That track record is worth remembering now. Marineland closed to the public in 2024 after the deaths of its longtime owners, and the park has said for months that it can no longer afford to care for the animals still on its property. A plan to send all 30 belugas and four dolphins to an aquarium in China fell through after Canadian regulators objected, leaving the animals’ future genuinely uncertain. Oceanografic, along with a coalition of accredited aquariums across the U.S., stepped forward to take them in instead, coordinating one of the most complex animal relocation efforts ever attempted, veterinarians accompanying every flight, custom cold-water transport units, and gradual, carefully paced introductions once each animal arrives.
For Echo, Lida, Marina, Tsunami, Cleopatra and Jelly Bean, that effort ends with expert care in one of Europe’s premier marine facilities, a place with a genuine, repeated history of taking in animals precisely when they need it most. Six belugas remain at Marineland awaiting their own transfer. If Oceanografic’s record is any indication, whichever animals eventually make their way to Valencia will be arriving somewhere that has proven, more than once, it knows exactly what to do with a second chance.
