NOS News•yesterday, 20:51
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A rare albino humpback whale has washed ashore in Australia. The dead animal may be the only known albino humpback whale to date, Migaloo, which scientists have tracked for decades.
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The whale has washed up in southeastern Australia, on a deserted beach that can only be reached by sea. The mammal was found this morning by someone who lives nearby fishing with his canoe. “It looked spectacular. The animal was completely white, like marble. It looked like a statue,” he tells Sky News.
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It is not clear how long the humpback whale has been on the beach. According to the man who found it, it already smelled a bit, but it was not yet visible that the carcass was decomposing.
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Migaloo
It may therefore be Migaloo, which was first spotted off the Australian coast in 1991. The male is the only known humpback whale with albinism (with no skin pigment) and is described by Australian media as a sea life celebrity.
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Since its discovery, Migaloo has been tracked by scientists via a chip. He went missing two years ago because he lost his chip.
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EPA
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Images of Migaloo from 2006 –
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EPA
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Migaloo was also photographed in 2009 –
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Scientists are now trying to determine whether it is indeed Migaloo on the basis of images and genetic material. According to experts, the location where the humpback whale was found matches the well-known travel pattern. The animal does seem slightly smaller than Migaloo’s probable length.
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Humpback whales live an average of 45 to 50 years. If the washed-up animal is indeed Migaloo, it would have been estimated to have turned 36.
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Scientists who have followed Migaloo over the decades are sharing information about the identification of the washed-up animal via the albino humpback’s Twitter account:
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