VERO BEACH — Wednesday morning at around 9:30 a.m., Herbert, the sea turtle, injured last June at St. Edward’s School water camp, returned to the Indian River lagoon. Herbert’s injury, rescue, recovery and ultimate release so fascinated a TV production team that he will be featured in a new Sea World series “Sea Rescue.”
Last June, while St. Ed’s campers were on a sandbar in the lagoon, the motor boat that pulls them in a raft hit the sea turtle. Immediately the driver stopped and counselors and the school’s athletic director, Jeff Lamscha, jumped into the water to save the turtle, holding its head up so it wouldn’t drown.
Bracing the turtle between them, they swam to the sand bar where the athletic director used his cell phone to call for help. In an hour experienced turtle rescuers arrived and took the turtle to Sea World in Orlando.
Herbert, a juvenile male loggerhead about three years old with a shell about two feet in diameter, had cuts to his head and seemed dazed and disoriented. At times during months of treatment at Sea World things looked grim. He developed an infection. He quit eating. But eventually he began foraging for food and diving and swimming about his hospital room, which was a circular plastic pool about five feet in diameter.
Ten months after his rescue, Sea World vets announced he was ready to be released.
Wednesday morning Lamscha and three counselors, who had been part of the rescue, drove to Sea World at dawn to help load Herbert into the back of a Sea World truck. Under the supervision of a Sea World team, they brought him to the lagoon at Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute in Ft. Pierce, where he was released back into the wild.
About a dozen people gathered on the lagoon shore at Harbor Branch to witness the happy moment. Steve McCullouch, chief of sea mammal rescue at Harbor Branch, thanked the athletic director and camp counselors for “stopping to help and be responsible” with the turtle.
“That’s the best part of this,” he said.
The team and counselors placed Herbert on the edge of the water where he sat motionless for about 10 seconds. Next, he moved one flipper then the other and glided into the water.
Lamscha, who had visited Herbert at Sea World during his 10-month recuperation, shouted “Live long and prosper!” as the turtle disappeared out of sight.
The small crowd applauded and a few people wiped away tears.
“With so much sadness in the world, it’s great to be part of a feel-good story,” said Lamscha.
Matt Murphy, a St. Ed’s senior who was a water camp counselor and a part of the rescue broke into a big smile when Herbert disappeared.
“It’s really cool to see this come full circle,” he said.
This article will be updated later with photos.