A humpback whale that died this week near a Danish island has been confirmed as the same animal that underwent a dramatic and disputed rescue operation two weeks earlier after becoming repeatedly beached along Germany’s Baltic Sea shoreline, Danish officials announced Saturday.
The deceased whale was discovered Thursday near the small island of Anholt in the Kattegat, the wide waterway separating Denmark and Sweden that links the Baltic Sea with the North Sea. This location lies south of where the whale, which had been given the names “Timmy” and “Hope,” was set free on May 2 following its transportation toward the North Sea using a specialized barge.
“It can now be confirmed that the stranded humpback whale near Anholt is the same whale that was previously stranded in Germany and was the subject of rescue attempts,” Jane Hansen, head of division at the Danish Environmental Protection Agency, said in an emailed statement.
Hansen noted that Saturday’s conditions allowed a Danish Nature Agency worker to find and recover a tracking device that remained attached to the whale’s back, and “the position and appearance of the device confirm that this is the same whale that had previously been observed and handled in German waters.”
