ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) – A large whale washed ashore at Anchor Point, drawing tourists and locals on Monday morning, and prompting a response from federal wildlife officials.<\/p>\n
Tim Hatfield, a lifelong Homer resident, was among those who discovered the stranded marine mammal. He said he had never seen a beached whale at Anchor Point before.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can definitely tell it\u2019s dead. I was looking at it to see if there was any damage,\u201d Hatfield said. \u201cI couldn\u2019t see any blood or any lacerations or anything.\u201d <\/p>\n
Hatfield mentioned not seeing any lacerations due to the fact that sometimes whales and other marine mammals are struck by propellers or large boats.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s big ships. You see them out there all the time,\u201d Hatfield said. \u201cI live on the top of West Hill [Road] here, so I can see the water,\u201d Hatfield said. \u201cAnd, yeah, it seems like this year, there\u2019s more big ships out there than I\u2019ve ever seen before.\u201d<\/p>\n
The stranding drew onlookers to the beach. Hatfield said he initially mistook them for officials investigating the whale.<\/p>\n
\u201cI kind of thought they were a science team coming to do the whale autopsy or necropsy or whatever you call it on the whale, but I quickly realized they were just tourists, kind of bobbing in the water, taking pictures of it,\u201d Hatfield said. <\/p>\n
The Anchor Point whale follows a fin whale found dead in Seward<\/a> last week. Hatfield said he also found a beached whale on MacDonald Spit last year and photographed another stranded in Seldovia last month.<\/p>\n \u201cI guess that\u2019s four whales and… well, I guess the one was in Seward,\u201d Hatfield said. \u201cSo, three whales within a year in Kachemak Bay, I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n