Rescuers saved 54 pilot whales after nearly 200 of the giant creatures beached themselves on an island off the southern coast of mainland Australia, officials said Tuesday.

Wildlife rangers and volunteers successfully refloated the whales and five stranded dolphins on the high tide at King Island, Tasmania's Parks and Wildlife Service spokesman Chris Arthur said.

"This means all the surviving stranded whales have now been refloated. This rescue effort would not have been possible without the exceptional assistance of the local community," Arthur said in a statement.

"We had as many as 150 people volunteering to rescue these beached animals throughout the day and their efforts are to be commended."

About 140 whales died after stranding on the island between the Australian mainland and Tasmania on Sunday night, but wildlife officials were pleased with the "extremely successful" rescue of the survivors.

The latest beaching takes the total number of whales stranded around Tasmania in the past four months to nearly 400.

More than 150 pilot whales died after beaching themselves on Tasmania's remote west coast in November and 48 sperm whales died in January on a sandbar at the north of the island.

Tasmania, Australia's southern island state, experiences about 80 percent of whale beachings in the country, a phenomenon so far unexplained by science.

"This last summer has been a particularly demanding one, not only for the specialist Parks and Wildlife Service officers but also the volunteers and local communities," Arthur said.

It was not uncommon to have both whales and dolphins strand simultaneously, with a group of 97 long-finned whales and bottle-nosed dolphins beached on King Island on 28 November 2004. All of them died.