At 7:24 in the morning of May 12th 1984, the captain of a Russian freighter crossing the Marmara sea made an urgent distress call to Istanbul’s port authorities. This was a call unlike any other, the captain was warning them of thousands of dogs jumping into the sea from the island of Sivriada and swimming towards the shores of the city. Instead of investigating the situation, the authorities contacted the company that owned the freighter to find out whether the captain passed a mental health evaluation prior to employment. By 4 pm the first dogs were spotted by helpless beachgoers on the Bostancı coastline. Scenes of panic soon erupted across the city as the dogs started landing on every coastline from Kartal to Eminönü. One major newspaper recorded the historic event with the headline: Dogs Have Swarmed the Beaches, Citizens can’t Go for a Swim.
Within a few days, the panic turned out to be unfounded. The newly arrived dogs simply diffused into the existing population of stray animals in the city, some moved to the countryside surrounding the city. Within a few days, it was as if nothing had happened. Various investigations have concluded that these were the reanimated bodies of the 80.000 dogs who were sent to Sivriada to die from starvation and drowning in 1911, as part of the governor’s strategy to Westernise the city. This tragic event is known as the Hayırsızada Dog Massacre. While many expected the dogs to be vengeful against humans who have sent them to die, most of them did not even want to have any contact with humanity. Their offspring still live in the city with a detachment and apathy to human existence that borders on smugness.