Officials remove body of massive whale that washed ashore on French island

A sei whale, the third-largest animal on Earth after the blue and fin whales, beached on an Atlantic island off western France and died overnight.

A crane and a lorry were used to remove the roughly 15-ton body, DPA reported.

Local authorities said a female sei whale approached a beach on Île de Ré, off western France, on Friday evening and was dead by Saturday. 

By Saturday evening, the carcass had been removed with a crane and lorry, and photos circulating in news reports showed the whale's body extending well past the trailer.

Sei whales can grow to enormous sizes and are listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List. Losing a sei whale like this is a major blow to conservation hopes, as their numbers are currently unknown and little study has been done. They were hunted to the brink of extinction from the 1950s through the 1970s, before they were protected. Now, only the Japanese are permitted to hunt them, with a 100-whale exemption each year. 

French media reported that this was the third recorded fin whale stranding on Île de Ré, after incidents in 1920 and 2017. 

According to Connexion France, the whale showed signs of feeding recently, but also found heavy internal parasite levels and significant injuries. They believe that a chronic underlying illness likely caused her to be washed to shore after weakening her, which ultimately led to her death.  

Experts were aware of its presence just offshore on May 29, prior to it making landfall, but weren't able to intervene to save it in time.  

Healthy whale populations help support marine ecosystems that coastal economies rely on, from fisheries to tourism. But climate shifts are changing where animals feed and travel, including the sei whale.

Researchers say large baleen whale strandings have been increasing along Western Europe's coasts, with ship strikes, entanglement, and ocean-warming-related shifts in prey among the suspected causes.

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