NZ Woman Rescued From Too-Friendly Dolphin

By Kevin Spak,  Newser Staff
Posted Jul 27, 2009 2:30 PM CDT
NZ Woman Rescued From Too-Friendly Dolphin
Visitors to Mahia are wowed by Moko, the friendly bottlenose dolphin that has made the beach her home, plays with a boggy board in the shallow waters in Gisborne, New Zealand, Friday, Dec. 19, 2008.   (AP Photo/NZPA, Gisborne Herald)

Moko, the famously friendly dolphin who hangs around the beach in Mahia, New Zealand, nearly accidentally killed a woman yesterday, the Gisborne Herald reports. The woman had been playing with the dolphin, and it refused to let her return to shore. "When I wanted to go back in, he just wanted to keep playing," she said. As she became cold and ran out of energy, she began screaming for help.

“My uncle came running into the restaurant and said to me, ‘There’s a girl stuck on the buoy and Moko won’t let her come back in,’” said the manager of a local establishment. “At first I thought he was joking.” He wasn’t, and they borrowed a dinghy from a nearby fisherman and pulled her from the water, "completely exhausted," said the rescuer. The woman insists she doesn't blame Moko and says she knows the dolphin meant her no harm.
(More Moko stories.)

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