A 35-foot whale identified as a Baleen whale was found beached at Priyadarshini Park at Napean Sea Road on Saturday. A similar whale was found dead at Uran on Thursday. Both were found in a highly decomposed state. There were unconfirmed reports of a third whale being beached off the Raigad coast on Monday. Meanwhile, many turtle deaths were reported over the last few days from the Raigad coast with 11 turtles found dead on the Shrivardhan coast on Saturday.
“We have got queries from Mantralay and Fisheries department and have been trying to find out the cause of the whale deaths for the past two days, but have been unable to do so. We are studying the migrational routes of the whales along the Indian coast and gathering information on it,” said Dr Vinay Deshmukh, principal scientist, Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute. However, he offered a possible explanation for the whale deaths. Read More
