Washed Up Minke Whale Shows Signs of Infectious Disease

On October 4, New York State Environmental Conservation Officers (ECOs) from the Department of Environmental Conservation’s Division of Law Enforcement’s Marine Enforcement Unit responded to reports of a whale carcass floating in the vicinity of Raritan Bay off Staten Island.
ECOs Paul Pansini and Abigail Kortz located the carcass, identified it as a deceased minke whale (Balaenoptera acutorostrata), and relayed pertinent information about its length, condition, and drift data to various local and federal agencies monitoring the carcass.
The Officers also affixed a GPS tracker to the whale carcass, allowing it to be tracked in real time via satellite.
The whale made landfall on Rockaway Beach near Fort Tilden the following morning and U.S. Park Police and ECO Veloski monitored the carcass until a team from the Atlantic Marine Conservation Society arrived to conduct a necropsy.
Despite the poor condition of the carcass, experts found signs of an infectious disease.
While not considered threatened or endangered, North Atlantic populations of minke whales are protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act and are currently experiencing an Unusual Mortality Event along the Atlantic coast.
Since January 2017, elevated minke whale mortalities have occurred along the Atlantic coast from Maine through South Carolina.
DEC urges the public to report marine mammal stranding events to the New York State Marine Mammal and Sea Turtle Stranding Hotline at (631) 369-9829.
Photo: ECO Paul Pansini affixes GPS tracking device to minke whale discovered deceased in the vicinity of Raritan Bay, Richmond County (provided by DEC).
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