A dead male sperm whale estimated to be about 40 to 50 feet long is currently anchored on a north shore beach on Nantucket while scientists determine what to do with it.
Members of Marine Mammal Alliance Nantucket secured the animal to the shore Sunday after receiving calls about it being washed up around noontime.
The hope is to keep it there until it is able to be moved to a secure, “undisclosed” location, MMAN Director Pam Murphy said Monday, so that a necropsy can be performed to determine its cause of death.
Such recovery efforts, which would involve dragging the animal out of the surf and relocating it using heavy equipment, could happen as soon as Monday, she said, though winds, swirling to the point of fast ferries being canceled Monday morning, were not helping.
That could slow the process as MMAN has called on mainland officials from the New England Aquarium, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the International Fund for Animal Welfare to assist in the effort.
Murphy said they are working to get to the island as soon as possible, but that may be Tuesday.
There is a chance that the corpse is decayed to the point where a necropsy can’t be done, Murphy said, but the whale appears to have only been dead a matter of days, by her estimate.
She did not speculate on a possible cause of death but did describe wounds that were seen by team members, such as injuries to its head and a gash on its back that one team member Monday said appeared to be “an older wound.”
MMAN members waded into the chilly water Sunday afternoon to secure the animal by wrapping a line around its peduncle (the base of its tail) and tying it off to anchors deep in the sand up the beach.
The job was “pretty tricky in that surf,” Murphy said Monday. “They did a great job of anchoring it. The onshore wind helped by the anchors held it fast as it tried to move down the beach.”
The whale remained Monday morning despite some concerns among team members that it would refloat and wash up elsewhere.
Some islanders walking along the beach made sure to stop and witness the whale, a rare sight on Nantucket today in contrast to the peak of the whaling era more than two centuries ago.
The North Atlantic stock of sperm whales today is estimated to be around 5,900 individuals, but they are seldom seen near New England shores.
This is now the third to wash up on Nantucket in the last three decades.
The first was a 47-foot whale that stranded alive on Low Beach in Sconset Dec. 30, 1997. Its skeleton is now on display in the Nantucket Whaling Museum.
The second was a 46-foot, 45-ton whale that washed up June 7, 2002, at Great Point. That skeleton is now on display in the New Bedford Whaling Museum.
Murphy said several island organizations, including the Nantucket Historical Association, were on scene to see the whale this week.
MMAN members were back on scene Monday to monitor the whale and ensure members of the public maintained a proper distance.
Though deceased, the whale is still protected under the federal Marine Mammal Protection Act, which requires people to stay at least 300 feet away from sea mammals, she said.
People are also prohibited from touching it.
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