NEWPORT- Marine scientists will not remove a dead whale that washed up
near Brenton Point State Park, because the terrain makes access too
difficult, Mystic Aquarium and Institute for Exploration said today.
The finback whale will remain at its location, where it will be allowed
to decompose naturally.
Scientists had hoped to move the 35-foot male whale to the Great Swamp
Wildlife Management Area in South Kingstown for a necropsy to determine
why it died.
Heavy weather prevented them from removing the whale when it was first
found floating. Now, terrain where it has beached is too rugged to allow
them to remove it or fully examine it where it lies. On Monday, the
whale's body had been wedged between rock outcroppings off Ocean Drive,
across from the park.
The Mystic scientists said they planned to be at the site today to
collect some data needed to monitor whale populations in New England
waters.
According to Mystic, finbacks are a species common to the western North
Atlantic. Observers had first thought that the whale was a humpback that
had become tangled in fishing gear off Newport last week, then freed.
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