'Extremely rare': 21-foot orca dies after washing ashore in Palm Coast - WJXT News4JAX

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Adult pistillate weighing astir 6,000 pounds is archetypal recorded stranding successful Florida, NOAA says

PALM COAST, Fla. – A 21-foot big orca whale died Wednesday greeting aft it washed up connected the formation astatine Jungle Hut Park successful Palm Coast.

According to Blair Mase of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the lawsuit is “extremely rare” arsenic determination has ne'er been a recorded incidental of an orca becoming stranded anyplace successful Florida oregon the Southeast.

Marine biologists with SeaWorld and officials with MyFWC Florida Fish and Wildlife were assisting with the big female’s necropsy and removal into Wednesday afternoon.

News4JAX spoke to the antheral who recovered the orca arsenic the prima roseate successful Flagler County. They said the orca was moving and appeared to beryllium live erstwhile it was archetypal spotted.

NOAA said its extremity present is to find retired however she died. Mase said whales usually question successful pods and they volition person to find what happened to her to recognize wherefore she separated herself.

Mase said the astir 6,000-pound orca believed to beryllium implicit six years aged volition beryllium taken to SeaWorld for further examination.

Mase said the results of the necropsy tin beryllium varied and it typically takes weeks oregon months for results.

Officials said to debar the country Wednesday afternoon.

The mammals, besides known arsenic slayer whales, are chiefly Pacific Ocean species.

According to NOAA, they are recovered successful each water successful the satellite but are astir abundant successful colder waters similar Antarctica, Norway, and Alaska. In uncommon cases, they are besides recovered successful tropical and subtropical waters, according to NOAA.

Orcas person been seen successful lukewarm h2o areas specified arsenic Florida, Hawaii, Australia, the Galapagos Islands, the Bahamas, and the Gulf of Mexico, and much temperate waters specified arsenic New Zealand and South Africa, according to Sea World.

For years, they’ve been spotted successful the Gulf of Mexico and a pod of orcas was seen successful the Gulf successful 2016.