Examination Of Dead Whale To Continue Thursday

The examination by Marine Mammal Center researchers of a dead whale that is now moored on a private beach in Richmond will continue into Thursday after high tides Wednesday afternoon caused the team to call it quits for the day, a center spokesman said.

Researchers spent most of Wednesday at the beach near the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge. They were performing a necropsy on the whale to determine its cause of death, center spokesman Jim Oswald said.

The whale, a juvenile male gray whale, was spotted at about 1:30 p.m. Tuesday between Fort Mason and Alcatraz. The Coast Guard sent out an 87-foot boat to tow the whale away so it did not pose a navigational hazard.

Coast Guard and Marine Mammal Center officials managed to tie the whale down at the beach so that it stayed in place overnight, Oswald said.

"The big fear was that the whale was going to wash away," explained Oswald.

The research team returned early Wednesday morning to perform the necropsy, he said. They have not determined a cause of death, but have concluded that the animal was malnourished, he said.

Researchers performed the necropsy on the beach and were taking samples from the animal for future study.

"We'll be seeing if there's evidence of malnutrition or marine debris ingestion, which seems to be more and more of a common issue with whales," Oswald said.

He said all that could be left of the whale at the end of the necropsy is the animal's bones, since most of the organs are being placed in metal drums to be taken back to the center for examination.

The team stopped the necropsy at about 3 p.m. as the high tide came in, and will return to continue the examination early Thursday morning after the tide goes back out, according to Oswald.