A two-mile stretch of sand along Sunset Beach will remain closed until Tuesday afternoon, Nov. 7, after a small whale came ashore and drew shark activity, Huntington Beach officials said.
The small whale – identified by staff at the Pacific Marine Mammal Center as a male pygmy sperm whale – was discovered near Tower 22 around 3:45 p.m. Sunday after beachgoers alerted Huntington Beach City Lifeguards about the whale, which was still alive and struggling to swim.
“Lifeguards confirmed the whale was in the surf and that it had bite marks on it,” said Jennifer Carey, spokesperson for the city. “Afterwards, they asked people on the beach if they saw anything, and they said they saw a shark and thrashing, and then the whale washed ashore.”
Carey said there were no injuries to people.
The shoreline and ocean on either side of Tower 22 will remain closed for one mile in each direction, per city policy, Carey said. The closure, which began on Sunday at 4:30 p.m. will remain in place until Tuesday at 4:30 p.m.
Carey said the whale was picked up from the beach by a rescue team from the Pacific Marine Mammal Center around 7 p.m.
The center’s veterinarian, Dr. Alissa Deming, said the whale was euthanized because it was too sick and wouldn’t have survived transport.
When the rescue team showed up, a large group of people had formed a circle around the whale, but Huntington Beach City Lifeguards were good at keeping people safe and from pushing the animal back into the water, Deming said. Struggling whales and dolphins have less chance of survival if they are pushed into the water when they already have difficulty breathing.
“It did have a shark bite, which is very common,” Deming said. “Scrapes and scratches are essentially a dinner bell for a shark.”
The rescue team first sedated the whale, which Deming said was clearly struggling and ill.
“We always go to the beach with the intention of rescuing the animal,” she said, adding that, in this case, the whale was going in and out of cardiac arrest during the evaluation process. “It was suffering and never going to survive a transport. This was an unfortunate outcome, but the best possible one for this animal.”
Deming said this whale species is known to be elusive and is not often seen in near-shore waters or even by boaters. They are also known to be among the deepest-diving cetaceans in North America.
On Monday, Deming and her team began work on a necropsy to see why the whale was so sick. Initial findings suggest it suffered from sepsis — an infection of the blood. Samples will be sent to a lab for further studies, which is a focus of the Laguna Beach rescue center.
“It’s very exciting to sample this animal,” Deming said, setting aside her veterinarian role and putting on her researcher’s cap. “It’s like sampling the depths of the ocean. It gives us an opportunity to learn about something we wouldn’t normally know about.”
PMMC has been called to Orange County beaches to rescue a pygmy sperm whale three times since Deming has headed up the rescue and research work. In 2019, one was also found beached in Surfside; in 2021, one was found on the sand in San Clemente, and earlier this year, another one was found on Bolsa Chica State Beach.
In 2019, another pygmy sperm whale washed up on Zuma Beach. It was also euthanized after it was determined it was too weak to survive in the ocean.
Justin Viezbicke, stranding coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said seeing this species near shore is “very uncommon.”
“They do inhabit areas offshore and are rarely seen,” he said, “except when they occasionally strand.”
Just as PMMC was wrapping up work on the whale, Deming was called out for a report of a struggling common dolphin off Newport Beach. As she headed out, she was optimistic, calling the dolphin species, the “pitbull of dolphins.”
