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A 21-foot orca washes ashore on a Florida beach Wednesday, in what the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration calls the first-ever stranding of a killer whale in the Southeast. Photo courtesy of Flagler County Sheriff’s Office
Jan. 11 (UPI) — The first orca whale ever to wash up on a Florida beach was found dead early Wednesday morning, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration which said it has no records of a killer whale ever stranding in the Southeast.
The 21-foot adult, female orca, more commonly known as a killer whale, was discovered stuck on a sandbar in Palm Coast.
“We saw something large in the water. It was about 25-feet offshore, stuck on the sandbar and it was larger than anything I’d ever seen stuck on the sandbar before,” said Derek Pence, who discovered the whale. “It was awful. When I called, I was really hoping for a rescue instead of a recovery.”
“I thought it was a baby whale at first, because of how dark it was,” Pence said. “The biologist thought I was crazy when I said it was an orca.”
According to NOAA, it is “extremely rare” to see an orca, which is primarily a Pacific Ocean species, become stranded in Florida or the Southeast.
“It’s an unusual situation. We have had a stranding in Cuba, and we have had sightings in the gulf — though those are rare” said Blair Mase, the coordinator for NOAA’s marine mammal stranding program.
Mase said the orca appeared to be over six-years-old and weighed approximately 6,000 pounds.
Marine biologists from SeaWorld and officials with MyFWC Florida Fish and Wildlife worked for hours Wednesday afternoon to remove the whale from the beach. The whale was taken to SeaWorld for a necropsy to determine how it died.
“Our thanks to SeaWorld and MyFWC for their help in removing a 21-foot orca whale from the beach near Jungle Hut Park in Palm Coast,” The Flagler County Sheriff’s Office tweeted. “A necropsy will be done to determine the cause of death.”
“I’m very curious because as I was as close to it as anyone. I saw no injuries, I saw no rutter marks, you now, nothing that would indicate that there was something wrong,” Pence said.
NOAA will also work to determine why the whale was found alone, since whales normally travel in pods.
Orcas are found in every ocean in the world, but typically inhabit colder waters such as Antarctica, Norway and Alaska.
Earlier this week, NOAA confirmed the death of a North Atlantic Right Whale calf off the coast of North Carolina.
“Based on images and video, experts estimated the male calf to be no more than a couple of weeks old. They suggested the animal appeared to be underweight and in relatively poor health,” NOAA said.
The calf, which was last seen alive on Jan. 3., was swimming close to shore inside of the Beaufort Inlet.
While they were able to locate the calf, scientific survey teams could not find its mother.
