{"id":598207,"date":"2026-08-19T15:32:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T15:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/598207\/"},"modified":"2026-08-19T15:32:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T15:32:09","slug":"whats-the-worlds-fastest-whale-clue-it-can-swim-at-a-staggering-37kph-despite-weighing-a-hefty-70-tonnes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/598207\/","title":{"rendered":"What&#8217;s the world&#8217;s fastest whale? Clue &#8211; it can swim at a staggering 37kph, despite weighing a hefty 70 tonnes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>You may not expect an animal measuring to 24m in length and weigh up to 70 tonnes &#8211;  to be fast, but these truly impressive cetaceans really are.<\/p>\n<p>Known as \u201cgreyhounds of the sea\u201d the enormous\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/marine-animals\/fin-whale-guide-how-big-they-are-their-lifespan-and-just-how-fast-they-can-swim\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">fin whale<\/a> are the second largest creature on the planet, following the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/marine-animals\/blue-whale-facts\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">blue whale<\/a>, and can swim at up to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ifaw.org\/uk\/journal\/fastest-whales-dolphins-ocean\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">40 KPH<\/a><\/p>\n<p>In shape they also resemble their blue cousins, with sleek hydrodynamic bodies, signifiers of their speed. So fast is the fin whale it can outpace whale-watching boats which, in most oceans, remain its only pursuers.<\/p>\n<p>And it needs to catch a lot of prey. A fin whale&#8217; diet is usually made up of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/insects-invertebrates\/facts-about-krill\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">krill<\/a>, small schooling fish, and squid. In total fin whales eat around 2 tons of food daily. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"You may not expect an animal measuring to 24m in length and weigh up to 70 tonnes &#8211;&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":598208,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[61,60,82,263],"class_list":["post-598207","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/598207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=598207"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/598207\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/598208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=598207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=598207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=598207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}