Dead whale explodes

November 29, 2013 • 6:16 am

Warning: GROSS! Do not watch if you can’t take an exploding whale spewing its guts everywhere. (You’ll watch anyway)

I pondered long and hard about putting this up, but decided to because it shows not only the internal organs of a sperm whale, but the tremendous gas pressure that builds up inside a dead cetacean (there are in fact several videos of exploding whales on YouTube). But don’t think this one was killed; according to the notes, it was a washed-up whale that died of “natural causes”:

Sperm Whale explodes in the Faroe Islands while a man is trying to open his stomach. Sperm Whales are not killed in the Faroe Islands, this one died from natural causes..
This footage was originally shot by the Faroese national television. http://www.kvf.fo

Now I’m not sure why the guy was trying to open his stomach, unless they were trying to get ambergris or something, nor why anybody would be foolish enough to attempt this. But reader gravelinspector, who sent me this video, gives some useful answers:

I would have thought that with the prevalence of exploding whale videos on the Internet, people wouldn’t need telling this, but … well it actually looks as if this was a part of a disposal team, with appropriate PPE (Personal protective Equipment). I’d have used a long-handled knife though – probably something for forestry trimming, 6ft long – to vent the problem. At arm’s length. From the upwind side.
We’ve had several of these in the last few years in the Aberdeen area. And boy, do they stink! For a 10-tonne mini-whale, “something” could include a lorry (there is a video warning you to not take the lorry through the middle of a city though – you can guess!), but much bigger than that and you have no real choice but to cut it into pieces there and then.

46 thoughts on “Dead whale explodes”

    2. Yep ; it certainly happens. And it’s grounds for justified unhappiness. OTOH, there’s no suggestion that someone deliberately rammed the whale with a boat (as opposed to accidentally ramming, or ramming an already-dead carcass, or the whale being hit by (say) a trawl-board … or other shipping debris.
      Not disputing that humans are treating the seas like garbage cans ; but that is a different level of mis-treatment to deliberately setting out to hurt other sentient beings. (And yes, I have been supporting our MMO in his work. Not just because it is policy, but because I think it’s the right thing to do. Even if I do tease him about his spotter’s guide for cetaceans as being a “Japanese menu”.)

  6. Yuck. I’m not going to watch that because I’ve been sick the last few days so don’t want to look at something gross.

    I agree with gravelinspector, I’d be far away to poke that open! If you find a puffed up dead anything, if you poke it open, words cannot describe the disgusting aroma & something as large as a whale would be so gross!

    2. words cannot describe

      I’m sure that some poets have attempted to …scrub that deck.
      Words may not be able to describe … but memories linger. Adhere. Though they do mellow with age ; I almost recall climbing through that dead cow with … retching horror. But with death by slow drowning as the other option for the evening, the cow looked good.

  7. That was thermodynamically cool. Gross. Ah, how the animal kingdom does not always have proper pressure relief system.

  8. If indeed it washed up, looks like it washed up on a boat ramp.

    I’ve heard that disposal of such large dead carcasses often involves explosives, tho.

      1. Hmm, maybe better to blow a few small holes and let the seagulls etc handle things from there. Or, if you have a half ton of dynamite on hand, why not try a few sticks first to see what that does, sorta like the artillery corps does in finding range.

        Otherwise, hope they didn’t leave grandma in the back of the Cadillac while they went to watch the event.

    2. Oh, I would like to see you handling a whale beaching.
      From a considerable distance.
      No, seriously. I’ll get my telescope. Do I have time for a 500-mile round trip to get my GOOD telescope, and some more distance.
      Upwind.
      Wearing my second diving suit (it being very waterproof, but tattier than my best suit).
      Did I say upwind? [Sticks finger in the air.] “Where’s my popcorn?”

  9. I would be concerned that a blast of amines (aptly named cadaverine and putrescine among them) and thiols that big would be so highly toxic that it could seriously endanger your health.

  11. Yeesh!

    If something similar occurred with humans, funerals sure would be more, uhm, “interesting.”

    Vaal.

    1. Actually, it does occur with human bodies, but it takes a fairly long time for enough gas produced by the bacteria involved in decomposition accrues to a level that will bloat the body. This is why bodies are kept very cold in morgues and in funeral homes as the cold considerably slows down the process.

        1. Sometime I don’t know how glad I am that the whole “zombie movie” passed me by. with a shuffling gait, muttering “Brians!, Need Brians!”
          What did Brian ever do to the zombies?

    2. It already happens, but not from decomposition gasses:-

      J R Soc Med. 2002 July Pacemaker explosions in crematoria: problems and possible solutions
      Christopher P Gale, BSc MRCP and Graham P Mulley, DM FRCP

      Obese, fatty corpse causes out of control fire in crematorium building

      “…moves now to make sure that XXL bodies were routinely shipped to a special crematorium able to deal with the extra heat caused by larger bodies”

        1. And this is a bad thing?
          The bit I like best is Cleese’s running jump to take shelter behind the pot plants.

          2. I’m going to have to take you caving one day. Even if we don’t find something very dead, I can organise some spectacularly glutinous mud.
            Then there’s always “Cowsh Aven” in Swildons in Mendip ; the high rising roof closes in about 30 ft below the floor of a cow shed. The “sh” in “Cowsh” is not short for “shed”. One day that cave is going to be the entrance series to a spectacular through trip to come out of Wookey Hole. One day … they’re up to sump 12 from one end and #27 from the other end, so it may not be a beginner’s trip.

  14. Other mammals’ corpses, even human corpses, also accrue a great deal of gas inside them, which is why human corpses are kept very cold in morgues and funeral homes. It takes a fairly long time before the gas produced by the bacteria involved in the decomposition build up to a level that will bloat the body. In Pakistan, in 1972, when driving on the road back to Karachi we passed the corpse of a camel which was bloated like a balloon. It hadn’t exploded, but the stench was awful and could be smelled for hundreds of yards around it. I have often seen photos of bloated dead cattle and sheep, too.

    1. I was thinking of a very specific tool – though I realise that these are very regional. 6ft shaft ; 2ft bladed end with a 90deg bend in the blade ; designed for taking out bracken, small saplings and anything up to an inch or so across as part of clearing a walking route/ bridleway through woodland. We called it a “slasher”, because, uhh, it slashed. Right tool, for that job.

      1. 🙂 Your original descriptions had me thinking along those lines. I just HAD to figure out some way to make a dumb pun. And being the coward that I am, my thought processes drift towards solutions involving trained chimps or circular saw-wielding robots.

  18. Reminds me of a joke I heard once. There was this 500 lb. religion professor from Texas who died. His family couldn’t afford the cost of the oversize coffin, so they stuck him with a pitchfork to let out all the hot air, and then buried him in a matchbox.

  19. The guy obviously was well aware of what was going to happen when he stuck that knife in. There is actually a special tool for dealing with cattle that have eaten something that bloats them. It’s a long tube with a sharpened end, and you just stab them with it to let the gas escape. You really want to get away from the distal end of that tube as fast as possible, because of the smell.

    1. Ah yes, I was going to mention that about cows but forgot. When a cow gets all bloated, the vet can come and poke it one. The cow doesn’t seem to notice. Such an odd thing for the cow (both the bloat & the poke).

  20. I was moderately surprised that that one … err floated to the top … Oh, maybe not.
    Someone mentioned a gluttonous holiday somewhere? Completely not in my mind at all.

  21. Nobody seems to have answered the question of why this needed doing.

    From a brief explanation on one of the newspapers (plus experience of living on coasts) it’s that these carcasses are so huge, leaving them to rot or be eaten is not an option. The explosion danger (!) is a big factor too.
    Removing a single lump of 20 ton (whatever) whale is also not an option, so the body has to be chopped up into smaller bits.
    As the guy doing the cutting is from a local museum, they might be taking the skeleton or other parts for research or display.

    The bloating itself is well known and poking the corpse to get rid of it is also something that the scientists involved know about. Hence the red plastic.

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