Two more dead humpback whales spotted off coasts of New York, New Jersey
Two more dead humpback whales have been spotted floating off the coasts of New York and New Jersey, officials confirmed Thursday.
One of the whales was seen off Raritan Bay in New Jersey while the other is off Wainscott, New York, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the nonprofit organization Marine Mammal Stranding Center.
“Biologists across multiple organizations are currently assessing their resources to respond,” according to the Marine Mammal Stranding Center.
It’s not clear when the whales were first spotted but a witness snapped a photo of the whale off New Jersey around 10 a.m. Wednesday, NJ.com reported.
The New York Department of Environmental Conservation, New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, New Jersey Fish & Wildlife Service are working together to relocate the whales, according to the organization.
When contacted by The Post on Thursday, the Stranding Center said there were no updates on the situation.
The two are among at least 23 other humpback whales that have been stranded on the East Coast just this year, according to NOAA data.
At least seven humpbacks have been stranded in New Jersey and five in New York in what the agency has called an ongoing “unusual mortality event” among the cetaceans.
On May 19, a 18- to 20-foot whale was stranded on the shores of Robert Moses State Park on Long Island.
About 40 percent of the whales had evidence of human interaction, either ship strike or entanglement, according to NOAA.
Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace, told The Post earlier last month he believes the sonar systems used by vessels surveying the ocean floor to prepare to place wind turbines harm marine mammals’ sense of hearing, leading to more dead whales washing up on beaches.
Whales, along with other species affected by the sound pulses, could be guided to their death with strandings in shallow water, collisions with ships and getting caught in fishing gear, he said.
A NOAA spokesperson rejected a link between the dead whales and the sonar from survey vessels.
Currently, they said, “there is no evidence to support speculation that noise resulting from wind development-related site characterization surveys could potentially cause mortality of whales, and no specific links between recent large whale mortalities and currently ongoing surveys.”
