A 410-Pound Manatee Got Stuck in a Florida Storm Drain. It Took a Village to Save Him
City surveyors thought they heard rats in the storm drain, but it turned out to be a 7-foot, 410-pound manatee.
When city surveyors in Melbourne Beach, Florida heard strange chirping beneath the road on February 9, they thought it was rats.
They stopped their routine work, listened more carefully, and discovered something no one expected: a 7-foot, 410-pound manatee trapped deep inside a storm drain, desperate for help.
What happened next took hours of coordination, thousands of pounds of concrete removal, and a whole lot of heart.
How a gentle giant ended up underground
The manatee was found inside a “baffle box,” a concrete structure designed to filter pollutants from water before it enters the waterways. Not exactly a place you’d expect to find one of Florida’s beloved sea cows.
So how did he get there? The animal likely entered the drain pipe during a cold snap.
Manatees seek warm water during cold weather and often find refuge in natural springs, such as the Three Sisters Springs and Blue Spring State Park.
But many of those natural springs have either stopped flowing, been cut off by development, or been polluted.
The drain pipe likely appeared to provide warmer water. Unfortunately, the pipe contained very little water, and the animal could not turn around inside it.
Brandi Phillips, branch director for the University of Florida Animal Technical Rescue team, who was on site, said the manatee likely “panicked and kept crawling forward until he hit a dead end,” per the National Geographic.
“We’re so lucky that the surveyors were able to locate him, because I don’t think anybody would have ever noticed that he had been down there,” she added.
If those surveyors hadn’t paused to listen that day, this story might have ended very differently.
Getting the manatee out was no small feat
Freeing a 410-pound animal from an underground concrete structure took specialized equipment, careful coordination and constant monitoring to keep both responders and the manatee safe.
The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) normally handles rescue missions for distressed manatees, but they weren’t equipped to handle this particular situation on their own.
The Brevard County Fire Department received a call from the FWC at 2:30 p.m. The rescue team arrived about 30 minutes later.
First, ventilation fans were installed to pump fresh air into the drain.
A firefighter descended using respiratory protection and air quality monitoring equipment, then placed a large plastic sheet over the manatee to shield the animal from falling debris during concrete removal.
After receiving permission from the government, Brevard County Public Works removed 10,000 pounds of concrete.
That’s five tons of material carefully taken away to clear a path to the trapped manatee, all while making sure the animal stayed safe.
“The manatee was alert and moving at the time of rescue, which was encouraging,” says Blake Faucett, marine mammal biologist with FWC and the onsite lead for the manatee rescue. “However, he was underweight and had visible wounds. Responders worked carefully to minimize stress and handle him as gently and efficiently as possible.”
A private towing company helped hoist the manatee out of the drain free of charge, volunteering their services to bring the rescue home.
Video footage from Fox 35 Orlando captured the moment the manatee was lifted to safety.
Meet Melby — and his road to recovery
Once free, the manatee was loaded onto a truck and transported to SeaWorld for care.
As of 2025, SeaWorld has rescued over 1,000 manatees since the inception of the program in the 1970s, per National Geographic.
At SeaWorld, the care team focused on hydrating and warming the manatee while treating cuts and scrapes on his belly and underside, along with an infection. They estimate the manatee to be two years old.
They gave him a name: Melby.
To put his size in perspective, at 7 feet long and 410 pounds, Melby is longer than most couches and heavier than two adult men combined — and he’s only two.
SeaWorld and FWC will coordinate his release back into the wild once his health improves. That means there’s still a happy chapter ahead, when Melby returns to the warm waters where he belongs.
The successful rescue took a village
What makes this rescue so moving is the sheer number of people who dropped everything to help.
Surveyors who stopped to listen. Firefighters who climbed underground. Wildlife biologists who guided every step. Public works crews who removed thousands of pounds of concrete. A towing company that showed up free of charge. And a veterinary team now nursing Melby back to health.
“The moment the manatee was successfully removed from the culvert was significant. After hours of coordination and effort, seeing him safely secured and transported for care was both a relief and a powerful reminder of what partnership and preparation can accomplish,” Faucett said of the rescue.
Phillips put it simply: “It did take a village to save this manatee.”
Melby’s rescue started because a few workers doing their everyday jobs heard something strange and decided to investigate.
They didn’t have to stop. But they did. And because of that, a two-year-old manatee named Melby is alive, recovering, and one day heading home.
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