Dead whale near Alameda moved to determine cause of death

A tow boat with flashing lights slowly maneuvered through the water, pulling what appeared to be a large mass with several birds perched on top in the San Francisco Bay on Monday.

"It's 40,000 pounds. It is 35 feet long," said Capt. Philip Delano of TowBoatUS San Francisco Bay and Delta.

It was the carcass of a female gray whale that had washed up dead near the Alameda shoreline on Saturday evening. It was visible from Crown Beach until Monday morning when the tide carried it north towards Ballena Avenue. Coincidentally, ballena means whale in Spanish.

"It was drifting off the coast of the south side of Alameda. We had to find the whale, get it hooked up, and towed to its final resting place at Angel Island," said Delano.

Scientists from the California Academy of Sciences will conduct an animal autopsy, called a necropsy, to determine how and why the whale died.

Throughout the weekend, residents of Alameda were saddened and puzzled by the sight.

"How did it die? Why was it so close to shore here? It's really shallow," said Elizabeth Scott of Alameda.

"It would be interesting to find out what the cause of death was," said Dennis Hallam of Alameda.

The most common causes of whale deaths are boat strikes, entanglement, and poor nutrition. Marine scientists said there were no initial signs the whale suffered from any of these issues.

"What we'll do, once we get to a point where we can study it, we will open it up and look for broken bones and hemorrhaging and other signs of a possible vessel strike," said Moe Flannery of the California Academy of Sciences.

Scientists managed to gather some samples from the whale's blubber, but a full necropsy is required to determine what happened to the whale.