Cruise ship docks in Vancouver with WHALE impaled on its bow

[CougarKing]

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2009/07/25/bc-cruise-ship-whale-impaled.html

Whale impaled on cruise ship in Vancouver
Last Updated: Saturday, July 25, 2009 | 3:13 PM PT
(CBC)A cruise ship pulled into the Port of Vancouver on Saturday morning with a dead fin whale impaled on its bow.

Jeff MacDonald, who was at Canada Place watching the ship come in, said seeing the impaled mammal "was a shock. You don't expect to see something like that and, you know, there's a lot of people staring at it — it's a very sad thing to see — and you kind of wonder how it would happen in the first place.

(...)

Christianne Wilhelmson, the managing director of the marine conservation group Georgia Strait Alliance, said incidents like this are all too common.

"It's kind of a tragic example of what happens when ships meet whales … There's more and more tanker traffic, there's more and more cruise ship traffic and what you have is an animal that's trying to make its way through all this."

Wilhelmson said that traffic generates a lot of noise underwater, which confuses the whales.

"They can't talk to each other, they can't hear their environment. We're going to have more incidents like this," she said.

"It's very possible that what happened here is the animal just had no idea the ship was there and this tragedy happened because of that."

Witnesses said the Princess Cruise Lines' Sapphire Princess pulled into port to allow passengers to disembark.

In a statement released on Saturday, the company said it was "shocked and saddened" by the discovery, and regretted the circumstances that led to the whale's death.

It emphasized the strict policy the company has in place to avoid whales and marine life, and added it was not known how or when the whale became impaled.

 

[Michael OLeary]

Cruise ship kills whale
http://www.chineseinvancouver.ca/2009/07/cruise-ship-kills-whale/

 

[Neill McKay]

Thanks for the pictures.  It looks as if the whale isn't really impaled, but just stuck on top of the bulbous bow.  Equally dead, obviously, but it's not as if it was speared by the ship as the press have suggested.

 

[SARgirl]

The poor whale! 

 

[aesop081]

The poor whale! 

Ocean version of roadkill.......shit happens.

 

[Roy Harding]

Is it possible that the ship didn't kill it?  IE - the whale was already dead, and simply got caught on the ships bow?  Do whales float when they die?

Just a thought.

 

[SARgirl]

Ocean version of roadkill.......crap happens.

Agreed.

 

[SARgirl]

Do whales float when they die?

I'm not sure how reliable this answer is however, I found it when I googled the question you posted. 


Answer:
It's very common, yes.
Dead whales often wash up on beaches.

Link Where Answer was Found:
http://www.answerbag.com/q_view/1217646

-------

This information is interesting as well; it's a short read:
http://www.ehow.com/about_4613775_why-dont-whales-sink.html

 

[Roy Harding]

Thanks, egy.

I meant it as a rhetorical question - upon re-reading my post that intention wasn't obvious.

But my NON-rhetorical question remains - is it possible that the whale was already dead before the ship "picked it up"?  Nobody in the MSM seems to be asking that question (that I've seen) - they're all set on "whales good - shipping bad".

Roy

 

[SARgirl]

Thanks, egy.

Your welcome.  I'm happy to help.

I meant it as a rhetorical question - upon re-reading my post that intention wasn't obvious.

Rhetorical questions do not end in a question mark.     

But my NON-rhetorical question remains - is it possible that the whale was already dead before the ship "picked it up"?  Nobody in the MSM seems to be asking that question (that I've seen) - they're all set on "whales good - shipping bad".

Roy

I'm sure this is possible... anything is possible.

Since a dead whale often times does float (based on the answer I found online in an above post) and then from there, a whale does some times wash up on shore; I don't see why the whale couldn't have died prior to the ships arrival and for the whale to have been still in the 'floating' part of the process. 

Whether the whale had died prior to the ships arrival verses the whale having been killed by the ship is, in all likelihood, this is a question which could only be confirmed by the whale undergoing an autopsy. 

Without an autopsy to confirm one way or another, I doubt this is a question any one could, for certain, answer.

 

[HollywoodHitman]

I love sushi.

I've never heard of this happening before. You'd think they might have noticed some handling issues at speed if they'd been dragging it around for awhile, and I'd think even a whale might make a bump?

 

[Michael OLeary]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapphire_Princess

The Sapphire Princess is a cruise ship owned by Princess Cruises which entered service in 2004. It is one of the world's largest cruise ships, with a capacity of approximately 2670 passengers and is the sixth Grand Class ship built by Princess Cruises.

Tonnage: 116,000 GRT

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fin_whale

The Fin Whale is usually distinguished by its great length and slender build. The average size of males and females is 19 and 20 meters (62 and 66 ft), respectively. Subspecies in the Northern Hemisphere are known to reach lengths of up to 24 meters (79 ft), and the Antarctic subspecies reaches lengths of up to 26.8 meters (88 ft).[3] A full-sized adult has never been weighed, but calculations suggest that a 25 meter (82 ft) animal could weigh as much as 70,000 kilograms (154,000 lb). Full physical maturity is not attained until between 25 and 30 years, although Fin Whales have been known to live to 94 years of age.[15] A newborn Fin Whale measures about 6.5 meters (21 ft) in length and weighs approximately 1,800 kilograms (4,000 lb).[16] The animal's large size aids in identification, and it is usually only confused with the Blue Whale, the Sei Whale, or, in warmer waters, Bryde's Whale.

116,000 tons versus (up to) 70+ tons, the whale probably didn't even register as a "bump."

 

[RubberTree]

Here in Vancouver it was all over the news...exciting stuff dead whales.
They towed the whale away and according to the news broadcast are planning on performing an autopsy to confirm cause of death. So I guess someone did ask the question, Roy.
We will probably never learn the results however and the story will remain Whales good Shipping bad.

 

[X-mo-1979]

I say we should be able to harpoon more,if ships are hitting them maybe it overpopulation.My neighbor at home has whale bones making an arch over his driveway and a harpoon on the lawn.

Or we save all the whales and put them in zoo's where they can't get hurt.

 

[SARgirl]

I say we should be able to harpoon more,if ships are hitting them maybe it overpopulation.My neighbor at home has whale bones making an arch over his driveway and a harpoon on the lawn.

Or we save all the whales and put them in zoo's where they can't get hurt.

Most whale populations are slowly becoming depleted... mass harpooning would only cause additional extinctions.

It is highly unlikely the ship and whale fender-bender had anything to do with an over population of whales; espeically given that almost all whale populations are on the decline and several types of whales are flirting with the line by where their numbers could easily drop below a sustainable level.  Several whale populations have already become extinct and there are several other types of whales which could easily follow suit.

Whale Population Estimates (year varies depending on when data was available)
http://archive.greenpeace.org/oceans/whaling/whalepopulations.html

Whale Population Table (again, year varies depending on when data became available)
http://www.iwcoffice.org/conservation/estimate.htm

Whale Population Statistics (89'), scroll down for table
http://whale.wheelock.edu/whalenet-stuff/ser_population.html

I haven't heard of a whale and ship fender-bender before, this is, from what I can tell, a rare one off... to link this incident to whale populations is a huge stretch.

 

[SARgirl]

We will probably never learn the results however and the story will remain Whales good Shipping bad.

If enough hullabaloo was made about getting those results out to the public, then the autopsy results may, eventually, be released. 

 

[JBoyd]

UPDATE:

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2009/07/27/bc-vancouver-whale-impaled-ill-towed-sink.html

A fin whale found dead against the bow of a cruise ship in Vancouver on Saturday might have been ill, according to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

Paul Cottrell, the department's marine mammal co-ordinator, cited early findings of the forensic analysis of the carcass.

"The blubber layer was a little more thin than typical for that size of animal and the stomach was empty, which indicates the animal hadn't been eating for a while," he said.

more on link

 

[FastEddy]

I say we should be able to harpoon more,if ships are hitting them maybe it overpopulation.My neighbor at home has whale bones making an arch over his driveway and a harpoon on the lawn.

How quaint,definitely shows great imagination and taste.

 

[X-mo-1979]

How quaint,definitely shows great imagination and taste.

It was his lively hood for 40 years.Some people's dads worked in the sears shoe section, others shot whales with harpoons.