"Have you seen the whale?"

On any other day in London, I would have thought the person asking such a question was mad. But the unusual does happen in London from time to time. This weekend, a whale decided to get itself stranded in the River Thames. It was first sighted on Friday, and by Saturday morning it had swam westwards towards Battersea. It was all over the frontpages, all over websites, and BBC even had a helicopter over the site to provide live coverage over a webcast.

This was one lost whale. Northern bottlenose whales are found in deep, open waters in the North Atlantic (more info on BBC), so it’s a rare sight around here. It was so distressed… rescuers mounted a full-sale operation in an attempt to save it.

I first heard of the news on Friday night, after coming back from the first day of our ICMUN conference. Dad came to London on Sat, and he knew of it too… and was interested in checking it out. So after some time at the computer trying to figure out where exactly the whale was then, we headed off towards Battersea, joined by Xi (who had abandoned her post at the conference).

It was packed full of people… bikes, cars and baby prams parked right by on the pathway, Toddlers sat on daddies’ shoulders, teens and old men climbed up lamp posts… when I last went to Alberts Bridge for Guy Fawkes fireworks it wasn’t even this packed.

I was at the back at first, and couldn’t see what was happening. But twice the crowd clapped, and so it must have been something accomplished. When I finally found a gap which could fit me and my new VR 80-400mm, the whale was already lifted onto the salvage vessel. People clapped again. I reckon everyone thought it was a successful mission, and the whale was saved. As the rescue team and boats made off eastwards away from Battersea, people started to disperse, and everyone was happy.

———-

My dad called me this morning from the cab, as he was heading to Heathrow. He said that the whale had died. I knew… I was reading the news and following every piece of article and radio broadcast. They said it died from “natural causes at 1900 GMT after suffering convulsions”. It was such a magnificent beast… at up to seven tonnes and 18ft… and yet its life was just as fragile as any other animal’s. A sad ending for this out-of-the-ordinary cetacean.

Onlookers gather on Alberts Bridge

Watching the rescue team at work

Whale on mattress on barge

Keeping the whale wet

Waving goodbye

Reporters interviewing Guy-who-was-in-water-with-the-whale