Hundreds of people watched from the beach and the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf on Thursday as a fin whale swayed in the surf at Cowell Beach in Santa Cruz, California, according to Good Times and Lookout Santa Cruz. The whale died that morning.
Juli Limon, stranding coordinator with the Marine Mammal Stranding Network at UC Santa Cruz’s Long Marine Laboratory, told Lookout Santa Cruz the whale was first reported between 8:00 and 8:30 a.m. “alive with strong breath.” At 9:31 a.m., KSBW reported that rescue crews were waiting for the tide to drop before trying to guide the whale back to deeper water.
By 10 a.m., the whale showed no apparent signs of breathing, Lookout Santa Cruz said. ABC7 put the time of death at about 10:15 a.m.
Responders found the whale severely emaciated, with signs of long-term illness, ABC7 reported. It was a sub-adult, and officials estimated its weight at 25,000 to 30,000 pounds, according to KAZU. A KSBW reporter estimated its length at about 30 feet. Researchers first considered a rescue but decided the animal was clearly sick, KAZU said.
Removing the whale was its own challenge. Towing a carcass out to sea is usually preferred, but the whale’s weight and an incoming storm made that too dangerous, especially near the wharf, KAZU reported.
The city planned to tow it across the beach onto a flatbed trailer, with a rope around the fin to keep it from drifting toward the wharf. The area around the whale was closed, and officials asked the public to stay behind the perimeter.
Scientists plan to keep the carcass for a necropsy. The cause of death is not yet known. “Obviously, protecting human safety is our primary concern,” Robin Dunkin, director of the Marine Mammal Stranding Network, told KAZU. She also called whale carcasses “a really important source of information and science.”
Coastal crews from before faced whale-carcass puzzles differently. In 1970, Oregon highway crews packed a dead sperm whale with a half-ton of dynamite, and the blast rained blubber on spectators.
Fin whales are the second-largest animals on Earth, after blue whales, and they are listed as endangered under the federal Endangered Species Act, according to Good Times.
Related: In 1972, Hugh Davis gave his wife a concrete whale on Route 66 for their 34th anniversary; a visitor center opened there in 2026
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