'Hundreds' of dolphins beached in PhilippinesMore than 200 dolphins have beached themselves on Manila Bay Manila Bay, nearly landlocked inlet of the South China Sea, SW Luzon, the Philippines. About 35 mi (56 km) wide at its broadest point and 30 mi (48 km) long, it is the best natural harbor in E Asia and one of the finest in the world. , officials in the Philippines said Tuesday as they tried to work out why the marine mammals marine mammals mammals inhabiting the sea; generally taken to include the cetaceans (whales, porpoise, dolphin), the sirenians (sea-cows, including manatees and dugong) and the pinnipeds (the carnivores of the group, seals, sealions, walruses). had come ashore. Residents saw huge pods of dolphins near the towns of Pilar Pilar strong-minded female leader of a group of guerrillas in the Spanish Civil War. [Am. Lit.: Hemingway For Whom the Bell Tolls] See : Female Power Pilar and Abucay on the Bataan peninsula The Bataan Peninsula is a rocky extension of the Zambales Mountains, on Luzon in the Philippines. It separates the Manila Bay from the South China Sea. The peninsula features Mount Natib (1,253 m) in the north and the Mariveles Mountains in the south, which includes Mount Samat, west of Manila. Bataan governor Enrique Garcia said at least three have died. "This is an unusual phenomenon," Bureau of Fisheries fisheries. From earliest times and in practically all countries, fisheries have been of industrial and commercial importance. In the large N Atlantic fishing grounds off Newfoundland and Labrador, for example, European and North American fishing fleets have long and Aquatic Resources director Malcolm Sarmiento told local radio, estimating the number of dolphins at "more than 200." He said they could be reacting to a "heat wave or disturbance at sea" such as a possible major underwater earthquake. Since they are mammals, the dolphins have ears that are sensitive to large changes in pressure underwater, he said. "If their eardrums are damaged they become disorientated and they float up to the surface," he added. Sarmiento said authorities' first concern was to keep the dolphins alive, and experts are being summoned to the area to help. He said smaller pods of dolphins numbering "in the tens and twenties" had beached themselves elsewhere in the Philippines previously, but this was the first time so many had done so at the same time and place. 
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