Blue whale is towed to Navy base - To preserve evidence, scientists want to quickly begin a necropsy that they hope will tell them why three such mammals have died.
Tow boat crews wrapped a huge nylon sling around the tail of a dead blue whale drifting in the Santa Barbara Channel on Friday and started hauling their grim cargo toward a beach at Point Mugu.
In a deepening scientific mystery, the blue whale is the third in two weeks found dead off the Southern California coast.
An endangered species, blue whales are the largest animals on Earth. Until last week, they were found stranded on California beaches or mangled on the bows of ships in the state's ports perhaps once a year, according to scientists charged with retrieving and studying them.
Instead of waiting for the latest whale to drift ashore, scientists sped up the process with a tow, enabling them to scrutinize the whale's tissues before they further decompose. The whale's destination -- a beach at Naval Base Ventura County -- was chosen so the public would not be exposed to the odor or the expense of getting rid of it.
"Nobody was jumping up and down saying, 'Pick my beach!' "said Easter Moorman, a spokeswoman for the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, which is coordinating the effort.
Under pelting rain and gusty winds, the Maverick and the Retriever, two boats owned by the firm Vessel Assist, left Ventura Harbor about 3 p.m., heading for the whale eight miles from shore. Hauling the carcass through the choppy channel was expected to take up to 10 hours. From the air, the vessels -- perhaps 30 feet long -- looked like dinghies next to the carcass, which was scraped up and bleeding. The boats took up positions on both sides, and crew members played out a looped sling and pulled it tight around the tail. One of the vessels would haul the load, weighing 50 tons or more, while the other accompanied it.
Sharks were gnawing at the carcass, but the looping technique kept crews from having to enter the water. "You can't put a man in that water," said Lynn Menick, the general contractor on the job and owner of a company that has been doing deep-sea towing since 1975. "It would be sheer suicide."
Scientists today plan to start a detailed necropsy. The process could last through the weekend and is crucial if biologists are to determine what is killing the whales.
"It's definitely got my attention and a lot of other folks' too," said Bruce Mate, a scientist who tracks whales off California. "This is a much higher number of animals dying in a much shorter period of time than usual."
