Mackay man Jack was enjoying a Sunday with his grandkids at Belmunda Beach, near Cape Hillsborough, when he spotted something in the sand around 3:00pm.
“We were just driving down the beach and I saw what I thought might’ve been a dead shark,” he said.
“We realised it was a dolphin … we got out with the kids, and it made a couple of noises and we realised it was alive.
“The poor thing was in the hot afternoon sun, laying on her side … she was pretty pink, the poor thing was a bit sunburnt.”
After throwing water on the 1.8 metre dolphin to cool it down, Jack dragged it by the tail to the water, finding that it was too shallow.
“I took her out as far as I could and realised the tide was going to beat me,” he said.
He took to Facebook group Mackay Noticeboard to enlist the assistance of locals.
“Within 15-20 minutes, we had probably three, four lots of people come down which was pretty damn good,” he said.
Jack fortunately had a tarp in his car, so the group of around a dozen lifted the dolphin into a ute with the tarp and drove it to the mouth of nearby Nobbler Creek, submerging it in about a metre of water.
“We did the best we could being amateurs,” Jack said.
“I think everybody’s instincts kicked in, you see this stuff on TV and you do your best.”
“The community support behind it was fantastic.”
Jack hung around until 7:00pm, making sure the dolphin had her best chance of survival.
“We got her in a pretty good spot,” he said.
“I just hope she’s alive.”
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