{"id":98343,"date":"2026-06-03T01:42:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T01:42:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/98343\/"},"modified":"2026-06-03T01:42:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T01:42:12","slug":"faroe-islands-locals-killed-over-700-porpoises-in-grindagrap-tradition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/98343\/","title":{"rendered":"Faroe Islands locals killed over 700 porpoises in &#8216;grindagrap&#8217; tradition"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Haunting images show the waters around the Faroe Islands stained blood red after locals slaughtered over 700 porpoises in a gory tradition known as the <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2021\/07\/02\/faroe-islands-slaughter-hundreds-of-whales-in-gruesome-tradition\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">grindagrap<\/a>, or \u201cgrind.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The single-day massacre of pilot whales and various dolphin species \u2014 including 406 killed in Torshavn, the Faroese capital, alone \u2014 surpassed more than two-thirds of the 1,000 marine animals killed in the Faroe Islands in all of 2025, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/seashepherd.org\/2026\/05\/28\/sea-shepherd-crew-arrested-706-dolphins-killed-in-faroe-islands\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Sea Shepherd<\/a>, a global environmental activist NGO.<\/p>\n<p>The gruesome custom involves herding hundreds of Atlantic dolphins and pilot whales into shallow bays with hooks, forcing them toward the shoreline and killing them one by one.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.50146628;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39560461\" width=\"886\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/faroe-island-dolphines-comp_426495.jpg\" alt=\"People harvesting pilot whales during a Grindadr\u00e1p in the Faroe Islands.\" class=\"wp-image-39560461\"  \/>The grindagrap festival in the Faroe Islands, Denmark.<\/p>\n<p>While the tradition is believed to have begun after the Nordic settlement of the islands in the 9th and 10th centuries, the scale of the 2026 hunt is unprecedented in modern times.<\/p>\n<p>This year\u2019s slaughter was even more horrific because the hunters had a shortage of spinal lances \u2014 which are mandatory for killing dolphins in Denmark\u2013 leading participants to use whaling knives and other rudimentary tools to inhumanely kill the porpoises, according to the activist organization.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMultiple marine mammals were instead killed using knives only leaving the animals stressed for an extended period before bleeding to death,\u201d Sea Shepherd said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn scenes of prolonged animal cruelty, reports also suggest the lack of equipment and shortage of participants led to dolphins being crushed against rocks, driven over and cut by boat propellers,\u201d they continued.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39560519\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Grind_27052026_Torshavn-2021.jpg\" alt=\"Overhead view of boats and people in a red-stained harbor, with a village in the background.\" class=\"wp-image-39560519\"  \/>The water was stained bright red from the slaughter of porpoises in the Faroe Islands. Sea Shepherd \/ Torshavn<\/p>\n<p>Spinal lances quickly sever the spinal cord and major blood vessels of the animals, causing rapid unconsciousness and death. Whaling knives, the blunt, broad alternative mainly used for carving fat, were also used in the 2021 grind, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.oceancare.org\/en\/stories_and_news\/faroe-islanders-tool-up-to-kill-more-dolphins\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Ocean Fare<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>In Faroese culture, marine mammals like pilot whales and dolphins are viewed as a renewable food resource rather than a species that should be conserved. <\/p>\n<p>The Faroe Islands are an archipelago in the North Sea, governed as an autonomous territory of Denmark.<\/p>\n<p>Sea Shepherd marine conservationist <a href=\"https:\/\/seashepherd.org\/2026\/05\/28\/sea-shepherd-crew-arrested-706-dolphins-killed-in-faroe-islands\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">crews said they <\/a>face possible deportation in the Faroe Islands for documenting the hunts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Haunting images show the waters around the Faroe Islands stained blood red after locals slaughtered over 700 porpoises&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":98344,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[4],"tags":[14572,50797,26,43,34139,38797,1161],"class_list":["post-98343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-faroe-islands","tag-animal","tag-animal-abuse","tag-denmark","tag-faroe-islands","tag-traditions","tag-whales","tag-world-news"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/116683639638779861","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98343"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98343\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}