Seal suicide site found in Antarctica

New Zealand researchers have found a bizarre seal suicide site in Antarctica, where dozens of seals have inexplicably left the ocean, travelled 30km inland and gone over a bluff to their deaths.

Antarctica New Zealand (AntNZ) chief executive Lou Sanson named the seal cemetery in the snow-free Dry Valleys near Scott Base as one of the highlights of the discoveries made by the science teams sponsored by AntNZ last summer. "There are 50 mummified seals that appeared to have committed suicide by heading over a bluff in the Dry Valleys area," he said.

"The trouble is sometimes mummified seals look like rocks and you don't always see them until you're a metre away. "Others stand out like sore thumbs. "It's the huge concentration that's so amazing. It would have taken them weeks to crawl there. "We called the site Boot Hill, after the American West, where the bodies of unnamed villains were taken and buried without too much ceremony. "The slope is near Penance Pass and Purgatory Lake, which seems appropriate." The cause of the seals' suicidal journeys away from the sea remains a mystery, but almost all are juvenile crabeater seals.

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