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Whale’s bones to be used for display
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Posted on Feb 21 2005
The body of a 35-foot whale that got stranded on a beach on Tinian was gutted Sunday as part of efforts to recover its bones, so it could later be reconstructed for display at the proposed Marine/Environmental Sciences and Mariculture Center on Saipan.
Some 16 students from the Northern Marianas College and their instructors, John Furey and Barry Wonenberg, traveled from Saipan to Tinian on Feb. 20 to begin the process of recovering the stranded whale’s bones.
The whale was discovered sometime early last week on Masalog Beach on Tinian. It is a 35-foot male Bryde’s Whale, also called a Tropical Whale.
Upon arriving on Tinian, the NMCgroup was met by Henry Cabrera, the head of Division of Fish and Wildlife-Tinian. Tamra Faris of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration gave permission to begin the recovery of the whale’s bones, which will be used to construct a display for the future Marine/Environmental Sciences and Mariculture Center at Pau Pau Beach.
Assisting the NMC group from Saipan were NMC-Tinian campus administrator James Wedding; Tinian NMC instructor Howard Cole; and Tinian Cooperative Research Extension and Education Services representative Lawrence Duponcheel.
Cole said the first thing that had to be done was to secure the whale’s carcass with a rope so that the tides and waves did not wash it away. After securing the whale, the whale was gutted and the skin and flesh cut in several areas to increase the rate of rotting.
“It is hoped that nature will take its course and help reduce the whale’s flesh so that the bones can be recovered. The whole process for recovering the whale’s bones can take months,” Cole said.
