Harbour pollution ‘unlikely’ to be cause of whale’s death

A RARE whale which beached on an island in Cork harbour probably died of natural causes.

Preliminary tests carried out on the female Northern Bottlenose whale, which died on Rocky Island near the former Irish Steel plant, proved inconclusive yesterday.

But Dr Emer Rogan, a lecture in University College Cork’s zoology department who carried out the tests, said recent pollution incidents in the harbour are unlikely to have contributed to the whale’s death.

The six-metre mammal was not a particularly healthy specimen, Dr Rogan said.

“It was thinner than I expected and didn’t have a big blubber layer. That it came in at all was probably because she was ill. It probably died of trauma as a result of the stranding.”

The juvenile female arrived in Cork harbour on Tuesday evening. The whale was spotted swimming off Monkstown and in the deep-water port at Ringaskiddy areas, but she was lethargic.

Northern Bottlenose whales do live in Irish waters. But they are usually spotted in deep water miles off the coast.

The whale’s remains were dumped at sea yesterday by the Irish navy.