Five days ago, the central Maluku province in Indonesia was shocked on a mysterious sea monster floating ashore. Now, the sea monster has been identified as a baleen whale.
According to Washington Post, a mystery sea monster which was about 50-feet and with tusks had been washed up on the beach of central Maluku, Indonesia five days ago. The existence of the giant mysterious sea monster which thrilled the island people was, later on, found out as a stinky baleen whale.
However, before the mystery sea monster was determined as a baleen whale, its images get viral on the internet. People were curious what the sea monster is and how did it get into Indonesia or when did it come from? The questions were further supported by the ideas that climate change may have something to do with the creature.
The 37-year-old local resident Asrul Tuanakota first discovered the mystery sea monster. After a few days, whale, biologist Alexander Werth from Hampden-Sydney College, Virginia identified the appearance of the whale as a baleen whale, Live Science reported. Werth said, "There is lots of stuff in the ocean that we don't know about, however, there's nothing as big as the baleen whale."
Werth was able to identify the mystery sea monster as a baleen whale on its throat pleats or grooves, and on its upper jaw that is used for filtering foods on its mouth. Meanwhile, it's not clear from which species does the baleen whale came from, whether from a Bryde's whale or a blue whale.
On the other hand, Moe Flannery, the Collections Manager in Ornithology and Mammalogy from California Academy of Sciences said that the mystery sea monster could also be a fin whale if it's not a baleen whale, but it's definitely not a humpback.
Werth added that there are two possible causes of the death of the mystery sea monster. The baleen whale could have been swiped by a ship causing internal injuries or the baleen whale had the bacterial infection which caused its body to inflate like a balloon.
