Royal Ontario Museum’s recovery efforts of two Newfoundland whale carcasses begin in earnest

The death of two rare blue whales that washed up on the shores of Newfoundland and Labrador last month is inarguably disappointing, but the process has begun to form a silver lining around those dark clouds.

Scientists from the Royal Ontario Museum's biodiversity crew have arrived on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean and have embarked on a multi-year mission to preserve the carcasses for study and display.

The two massive blue whales were among nine that were crushed in an ice field off the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador late last month.

When they first washed up on shore, locals were told removal of the carcasses would be their problem. After some outrage, and international exposure, that problem made was for possibility.

A conclusion was finally reached last week after the Royal Ontario Museum expressed interest in obtaining the two whale carcasses for scientific study.

The recovery efforts began in earnest on Wednesday, when scientists landed on the shores of Trout River and Rocky Harbour, two quaint villages along the picturesque shorelines of Newfoundland.

The ROM's Jacqueline Waters has detailed the journey in a blog for the museum, and wrote on Wednesday about arriving in Trout River to start the project.

What would a fancy museum want with a slightly decomposed, slightly eaten and slightly sliced-up whale carcass? The plan is to recover the whale bodies for scientific research and preserve the massive skeletal systems for potential future display.

Considering blue whales are one of the largest animals to ever live on Earth, according to Canada's Ministry of Fisheries and Oceans, there is certainly a great deal of interest in the beasts. And considering how rare it is to see or touch them, with fewer than 250 adult whales in the Northwest Atlantic population, there is surely more to learn about them.

So this is a win-win-win. The science community gets its subjects, the public gets an opportunity to learn about the species. And the actual communities aren't stuck watching these bodies decompose and possibly explode with noxious gases (though some locals are miffed the scientific gems are being snatched and rushed off to Toronto).

The plan is to pull the carcasses up the coast to Woody Point, away from the prying eyes of friendly locals, where the crew being working to preserve the bodies and prepare them for their trip to Toronto.

The crew has posed photos of the move on Twitter for the entire world to see.

According to the Ottawa Citizen, the bodies will first be stripped of skin, blubber and muscles. The skeleton will then be dismantled – by hand – and packed into crates for transportation.

The crates will then be transported by truck to Ontario. Tissue samples will be available for study almost immediately, but the bones themselves won't be ready for use for years.

"The skeleton will be packed in soil and manure for a year to help compost any remaining flesh," reads an explanation in the Citizen. They then have to be further treated and soaked for two years before they are of much use as a display.

It's a long process, a long road from the shores of Newfoundland to the streets of Toronto. But it will sure be spectacular and revelatory once the process is complete. I suppose that's what museums are all about.

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