Come Out with Your Flippers Up

It was just another day in San Diego as I hit the streets at 6 a.m., with the goal of finding, shooting, and transmitting breaking news photos, so they can be used on The San Diego Union-Tribune website ASAP. In many ways it’s a cat and mouse game of listening to the police scanners to find out where the action is, which has become more difficult because the cops are doing a lot of their dispatching via computer, and not the audible Adam-12 thing on a lot of good stuff. So listening for any type of tip, or out of the ordinary communication on what’s happening early-on, is more important because there's less of it than in the past. An officer reported to his sergeant that he couldn’t move his patrol car because “It“ was still under the car wouldn’t move, which got me wondering what could keep a cop from moving his car. After figuring out where it was happening, I headed to the Ocean Beach neighborhood of San Diego to find a sea lion hiding under a police car. It had come out of the ocean and decided to setup shop under the patrol car in the middle of the street at 4 a.m. The officer was checking-out a report of a sea lion under a parked car, and when he arrived, the pup came out from under the parked car and headed to his patrol car where he stayed four several hours until the mammal rescue folks from SeaWorld arrived, and in a matter of a couple of minutes, convinced the little guy to come out. They took him back to SeaWorld where he will stay for several weeks until he’s ready to go back into the ocean. This brings the motto of "To Protect and Serve," to a new level. More Photos.

Howard Lipin
Photo used by permission of The San Diego Union-Tribune

Come Out with Your Flippers Up