Saturday, around noon, a whale, a fin whale of 19 meters and of about fifteen tons, ran aground in the port of Calais, in Pas-de-Calais, after being injured.
“It is about a female of about thirty who ran aground on Saturday, she was ill, she returned to the port of Calais still alive, she went too close to the rocks and she failed ”, recounted Jacky Karpouzopoulos, president of the Mammalogical Coordination of northern France (CMNF). The specialist described a “violent” scene.
Precedents even if the phenomenon is rare
Monday afternoon, “we are going to tow it to put it on an area where we will be able, Tuesday morning, to operate its autopsy, then we will cut it up and it will go to the rendering to be cremated”, he said. Explain.
If the phenomenon is quite rare on the coast of Nord-Pas-de-Calais, there are nevertheless precedents. Last March, in particular, a 15 m whale was found dead on the beach at Merlimont. In November 2015, it was a herd of 10 pilot whales, which had run aground on the beach in Calais.