There are no crocodiles in Dubai waters: DM

Rumours of a crocodile plying UAE waters are ungrounded, and no crocodile has ever existed in the Gulf waters for at least the past 1000 years, said a statement circulated by Dubai Municipality. “This is part of a pure hoax. No crocodile ever existed in the gulf water at least for the past millennium!” said Mohammad Ali Reza Khan, Specialist, Wildlife and Zoo Management at the Public Parks & Horticulture Department at Dubai Municipality while responding to the rumour. Last week, a photo shopped image of a crocodile faring Dubai Creek appeared in the local media causing turmoil among residents. However, the image appeared to be part of a hoax carried out by a British tourist, who claimed he was recently on holiday in Dubai, walking in a construction area adjacent to Al Khail Road when he spotted what appeared to be a very large animal moving under the water in one of the artificial lagoons, said the statement of Dubai Municipality. Earlier, a resident of Dubai posted a thread on an expat forum describing what she thought to be ‘a small crocodile’ on the bottom of Dubai Marina Waters. “It was a couple of feet long and had flippers or feet which it was using to walk along the bottom. Now I was with my sister who has a PhD in Animal behaviour and I am an enthusiastic wildlife nut so whilst not experts on marine wildlife, we do have a fair amount of knowledge between us. After a lot of deliberation and googling we think it looked most like a small crocodile,” she wrote. According to Mohammad the west Odisha province in India is the closest crocodile habitat to the UAE. He added: “A Nile crocodile will not survive one day in our waters. Perhaps a million years ago there were crocodiles here, but these days Iran and UAE coastlines are not suitable waters for crocodiles. “They should not publish these stories without any verification and cause total panic. There are lots of ways to verify something like this.”