Fish farm workers have helped with the grim task of dealing with an estimated 1000 tonnes of dead pilot whale carcasses after the mass stranding in Macquarie Harbour in September.
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Aquaculture company Petuna Seafoods held a dinner last week to thank its people instrumental to the whale rescue and disposal of 360 bodies. It's believed 65 of the 111 whales saved were rescued by the Petuna team.
The dinner at the View Restaurant at Strahan celebrated fish farm employees and community members who helped. Ty Becker, Tom Mountney, Jack Horsley, Jimena Balli, Don McIntyre, Torsten Schwoch, and Wayne Bradford received awards for going above and beyond.
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Strahan Aquaculture Community Forum chair Dianne Coon said the community sentiment is one of gratitude to those who responded.
"We love to have Strahan in the international media but not for this reason," she said.
"But, it's a lovely feeling to be part of a community where so many worked together and did an extraordinary job.
"It was horrible to see so many whales die, but they did an amazing job and should feel proud of the great work, especially the hidden work once most people had moved on to remove 360 carcasses.
"They didn't get any of the nice feelings of helping rescue whales to be dealing with the carcasses is a horrible job."
Mrs Coon said significant work got done by staff of the fish companies Petuna, Tassal and Huon Aquaculture, Parks and Wildlife, police, ambulance, local boaties and some others.
"When cruise boats saw a dead whale floating around two weeks later, they only had to call the fish company to go and deal with it and we've heard how Petuna has led the way staying until the end, well past when the volunteers in the water were gone, and the cameras moved on because that bit doesn't make for good vision and we're lucky it's not smell-o-vision," she said.
"Excellent work was done by parks people and the fish farms to track down carcasses that floated to where people were."
Mrs Coon said to see the skill of the fish farm workers working in shallow water around the whales was phenomenal.
Petuna chief executive Ruben Alvarez said Petuna responded as it should.
"We were there from the beginning until the end to help...," he said.
"We are part of the community, and we need to behave like good neighbours, and what good neighbours do is help from day one until the end.
"We were lucky to have the vessels to support the operation, but everybody did something to achieve the outcome."
Mr Alvarez said the clean up was the grim part of the operation.
"Helping rescue live animals is very rewarding, and you feel you are doing something very nice. To clean up, is the difficult part when the media is not there, and there are fewer people to help with that," he said.
Mr Alvarez said Petuna did not seek compensation for what it did.
"I don't think it's appropriate. We are part of the community, and if your community is in trouble, you help not expect to receive anything back," Mr Alvarez said.
He said it would impact the whole harbour to have 1000 tonne of dead whales in decomposition.
Included in the rescue mission were three of Petuna's vessels, two cargo nets lined with 32mm mesh for lifting the mammals and five people to assist the recovery as needed.
