So Long And Thanks For All The Fish

Takoma, the Atlantic bottle-nosed dolphin, had been in Iraq for 48 hours when he went missing on his first operation to snoop out mines. His handler, Petty Officer Taylor Whitaker, had proudly showed off Takoma�s skills and told how the 22-year-old dolphin was among the most pampered creatures in the American military … Takoma and his fellow mine hunters have a special diet, regular medical checks and their own sleeping quarters … Petty Officer Whitaker had tempted fate by saying: “Why would they go missing when they have the best food and daily spruce-ups and health checks?” Two hours later Takoma had gone Awol. “Twenty-four hours is not unusual,” a nervous Petty Officer Whitaker said. “After all, he may meet some local company.”

Officers said he had gone off before but only for 24 hours. By last night he had been Awol for two full days. His handler, US Petty Officer Taylor Whitaker, has spent the past two evenings at the dockside with a basket of fish, slapping the water.

Prior to arriving in Iraq, experts had mentioned one worry about the marine mammal deployment there: the potential for a turf clash between the local Iraqi dolphins and the military dolphins, who were trained in California. Dolphins are territorial animals and there was some concern that the Iraqi dolphins might chase out their newly arrived American cousins, causing them to swim into other waters and out of military usefulness.