Whale Trapped Inside Nova Scotia Tidal Power Plant (?!?!)

[hatrack]

ANNAPOLIS ROYAL, Nova Scotia — "A hydroelectric plant in Nova Scotia has been shut down after a wayward whale swam through the facility's underwater gates in the Atlantic Ocean.

Officials said the 6-meter (20-foot) humpback was chasing a school of herring late Monday when it passed through the sluice gates of the Annapolis Tidal Power Plant, which generates electricity from the flow of the Bay of Fundy's record-high tides.

The whale was still trapped in the plant's so-called head pond by late Tuesday. Officials have asked boaters to stay away from the area.

"The whale made some attempts to go back to the gates, but the presence of boaters may have been a distraction," said Margaret Murphy, spokeswoman for Nova Scotia Power. Murphy said the utility is working with federal fisheries officials in a bid to coax the mammal through the facility's 9-meter-wide (30-foot-wide) gates and back into the bay."

EDIT

http://www.enn.com/news/2004-08-25/s_26694.asp