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This illustration shows how fishing lines attached to traps and buoys on the ocean floor present a potentially deadly hazard to North Atlantic right whales.
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How Whales Become Entangled

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An early scale model of North Atlantic right whale Phoenix that was used to develop a life size model for the Smithsonian shows the location of scars on her mouth from entanglements with fishing gear.
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Phoenix: Mouth Scarring

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A white scar on Phoenix’s lip (at right) was caused by her entanglement with a fishing line.
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Lip Scar Caused By Fishing Gear

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Phoenix’s entanglement badly injured her right lip, leaving a distinctive scar from that ordeal.
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Beware of Fishing Gear

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A team works to free a one-year-old right whale from fishing ropes wrapped and knotted around its body and flippers.
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Whale Rescue

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An early scale model of North Atlantic right whale Phoenix indicates the location of scars on her tail from entanglements with fishing gear.
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Phoenix: Tail Scarring

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A North Atlantic right whale with a deep wound caused by entanglement in fishing gear floats at the surface in the Bay of Fundy.
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Wounded North Atlantic Right Whale

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This is North Atlantic right whale #3333 who was spotted with fishing gear trailing from his mouth during an aerial survey off the coast of Georgia on January 29, 2008.
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Whale Entanglement

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