HALEIWA — The badly decomposed carcass of a humpback whale that nearly washed on shore at Haleiwa on Christmas Day was towed out to deep ocean waters Tuesday.
A private dive company, One Ocean Diving, first towed the carcass away from Haleiwa on Monday and Tuesday volunteered to go ahead and tow it further offshore. Monday, the remains were towed 3 miles offshore by one of the company’s boats and later, based on drift pattern modeling provided by the U.S. Coast Guard, it was towed an additional 10 miles offshore, due north of Haleiwa.
It’s estimated it died two weeks ago and that a cause of death won’t be possible to determine due to decomposition.
Last winter six Humpback whale carcasses washed ashore or into near-shore waters, the Department of Land and Natural Resources said in a press release. This is the first reported carcass of the season.