A dead juvenile gray whale that washed ashore in Half Moon Bay in Westport will remain there untroubled by the hands of man as nature takes its course.
The whale, a young male about one to two years old, may have been killed by a vessel strike, but there’s not enough evidence to conclusively identify a cause of death, said a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration public affairs officer.
“Oftentimes the hope is that it’ll wash back out during a high tide event,” said Matt Burk, a NOAA spokesperson. “It’ll be on our radar until it’s taken care of it.”
The whale, which is on state parks land, is inaccessible to the kind of equipment parks personnel would need to remove it, said Emily Masseth, a communications consultant with Washington State Parks.