SA Museum carves up smelly whale carcass that caused stink at St Kilda playground
Scientists from the SA Museum will spend four days carving up the decaying whale carcass at St Kilda. As for the smell – well, you just have to “get used to it”.
SA News
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Bad luck for a whale struck by a ship in the open ocean has handed scientists a “fabulous specimen” for the South Australian Museum.
Collections manager David Stemmer said it was lucky that strong wind and a high tide lifted the whale out of the mud and carried it to shore on Sunday.
His team made good progress on the first day of an epic four-day retrieval process.
“But we’re now at the stage where it gets a bit slower and trickier,” he said.
The scientists discovered broken vertebrae beneath the blubber.
Mr Stemmer said it was “highly likely” the Sei whale was killed by the collision, but not impossible that it was already floating dead.
The body is “too far gone” to yield its secrets now, so the scientists are carving the rotting tissue off the bones.
A good cameraman doesn’t miss a thing… in fact, they zoom in. 🎥
— Kimberley Pratt (@KimberleyPratt_) September 14, 2021
This was me having a ‘whale of a time’ reporting on the removal of the rotting, stinking carcass. 🤢 @7NewsAdelaide@CashinADL7pic.twitter.com/0ueK3gJz0V
They will then take the skeleton to the museum’s facility at Bolivar for many months of processing.
“It will still be a fabulous specimen for us. The skull, the mandibles, they’re all there,” Mr Stemmer said.
“Getting an almost intact skeleton will be great for scientists, to look at the form of the animal and understand the animal better.”
But what about the smell?
“It’s all relative … I would say it is pretty strong. You just have to keep breathing and to get used to it,” he said.
“I usually tell people who complain (that) it’s like when you go to the toilet. You can’t just hop off because it stinks.
“You keep sitting there and by the time you are finished you hardly smell it. That’s similar to the whale, you just stay there and keep breathing and you hardly notice after a while.”
Salisbury council deputy mayor Chad Buchanan said the council helped build an access ramp, allowing SA Museum to start retrieving the whale’s remains.
“The retrieval operation will be undertaken during low tides, between 10am and 3pm, and is expected to be complete within three to four days,” he said.
Outside of those hours the site will be monitored by security staff.
The whale carcass sparked a shark feeding frenzy at Outer Harbor last month, then washed up near the St Kilda Playground, prompting complaints from locals and Senator Rex Patrick for its “unbearable stench”.
A spokesman for the Environment and Water Department said the dead animal was a sei whale, the third-largest large baleen whale after the blue whale and the fin whale.
EARLIER
Local woman Dr Peri Coleman came across the carcass at St Kilda Bay’s shore just on her morning walk.
She suspected strong winds had brought the carcass into the shallows, after it had been seen bobbing about 400m offshore in recent weeks.
It’s the same carcass that sparked a shark feeding frenzy at Outer Harbor last month, and prompted complaints from locals and Senator Rex Patrick for its putrid stench.
“It was out in the middle of the bay, and we’ve been complaining about it because of the smell, asking for it to be removed,” Dr Coleman said.
“Because it’s right at the playground … as the wind develops, the smell is beyond believable,” she said.
Independent SA senator Rex Patrick took a series of drone images to raise awareness and prompt the authorities to take action.
“If this rotting whale were lying off Glenelg or Henley Beach, it would have been removed by now,” he said last week.
“Because it’s only the 90 local residents of St Kilda and children that visit the renowned St Kilda Adventure Playground that have to endure the stench, nothing has been done.
“The state government owes a duty to all South Australians equally.”
Ever since the dead whale arrived at St Kilda Bay, Dr Coleman has wondered if more could have been done sooner.
“While the whale was close to the deeper channels, it could have been either towed out to sea or to an unpopulated beach, to quietly rot, if the museum wanted the bones,” Dr Coleman said.
“But for every day it is left to inch its way across the shallows of St Kilda Bay, it becomes harder and harder for vessels to reach it, while remaining beyond the reach of land-based equipment.”
The dead whale first surfaced in the Port River on Sunday, August 22.
“The whale was struck and killed by an international commercial shipping vessel, was stuck upon the protruding bow, travelling an unknown distance, and became dislodged when the ship slowed upon entry into Outer Harbor,” a spokesman for the Environment and Water Department said.
“Several attempts were made to tow the whale carcass out to sea when it first became stranded within Port River shipping channel. These were unsuccessful due to safety concerns, as the carcass was being mauled by several large great white sharks.
“A series of high tides carried the whale carcass northward until it came to rest in its current location.”
Scientists at the South Australian Museum took tissue samples and wanted to reclaim the skeleton as they do not have samples of this species in their collection.
“Several attempts have been made at removing the carcass,” the spokesman said.
“These have been unsuccessful due to the shallow waters, the deep mud and state of decomposition, meaning it will not float.”
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