Dead whale in New Jersey had a fractured skull among numerous injuries, experts find
LONG BEACH TOWNSHIP, NJ — A post-mortem examination of a whale that washed up on New Jersey’s Long Beach Island revealed that the animal had suffered numerous blunt force injuries, including a fractured skull and vertebrae.
The Marine Mammal Stranding Center released observations Friday from a necropsy conducted Thursday evening on the nearly 25-foot-long juvenile male humpback whale found dead in Long Beach Township.
Sheila Dean, director of the center, said the whale had bruises around the head; multiple fractures of the skull and cervical vertebrae; numerous dislocated ribs and a dislocated shoulder bone.
“These injuries are consistent with blunt force trauma,” she wrote in a post on the group’s Facebook page.
When reached later, Dean would not attribute the injuries to any particular cause, noting that extensive testing still needs to be performed as part of the necropsy, with tissue samples being sent to labs across the country.
“We only report what we see,” she said.
The animal’s cause of death is of great concern to many amid an ongoing controversy over offshore wind energy opponents’ belief that preparatory work for the projects is harming or killing whales along the U.S. East Coast.
Numerous scientific agencies, including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; the Marine Mammal Commission; the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection say there is no evidence that offshore wind energy preparation is linked to whale deaths.
NOAA said Friday that 16 major whale deaths have occurred on the East Coast in 2024: seven humpback whales between Massachusetts and North Carolina; 4 North Atlantic right whales, which are critically endangered, in Massachusetts, Virginia and Georgia; two sperm whales in South Carolina and Florida; two minke whales in North Carolina and Virginia, and a fin whale in Rhode Island.
The beaching center’s website says this is New Jersey’s first whale death of the year, after 14 in 2023.
Leading Light Wind is one of three proposed wind farms off the coast of New Jersey. A statement issued late Thursday said “our community must guard against disinformation campaigns in response to these incidents,” noting that many of the previous whale deaths have been attributed by scientists to ship strikes or entanglement with fishing gear.
Protect Our Coast NJ, one of the most fervent anti-offshore wind groups, expressed renewed skepticism about official statements on whale deaths, citing similar distrust from some corners of official information about the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Blaming all cetacean deaths on entanglements and ship strikes is reminiscent of the phenomenon four years ago where seemingly every death was a COVID death, regardless of how old or how sick the patient was before contracting the virus,” the group said. in a statement Thursday.
Leading Light, whose project would be built about 40 miles from Long Beach Island, said it is committed to building the project in a way that minimizes risks to wildlife.
“Minimizing impacts on the marine environment is of paramount importance to Leading Light Wind,” project leaders said. “In addition to providing advance notice of our research activities and facilitating active engagement with maritime stakeholders, Leading Light Wind invests in monitoring and mitigation initiatives to ensure the offshore wind industry can thrive alongside a healthy marine environment.”
The post-mortem examination of the whale also revealed that it had been entangled in fishing gear in the past, although none was present when the whale washed ashore. Scars from a previous entanglement unrelated to the stranding were found around the peduncle, the muscular area where the tail connects to the body; on the tail itself, and on the right front pectoral fin.
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