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Undertoad · 01-29-2002, 01:42 PM

Followup: http://home.kyodo.co.jp/all/display.jsp?an=20020128190

KAGOSHIMA, Jan. 28, Kyodo - The town hall in Oura, Kagoshima Prefecture formally decided Monday to dispose at sea the carcasses of 12 sperm whales that beached there last Tuesday and later died, town officials said.

The move comes after the municipality only managed to haul one whale to a burial site of 13 whales that beached and later died.

Oura will wait for strong winds to calm before dumping the carcasses in the East China Sea about 13 kilometers off the cape of Noma in the town of Kasasa, Kagoshima Prefecture, they said.

Town officials earlier said they wanted to transfer the skeletons of the whales to aquariums two to three years after their burial at a beach in the neighboring city of Kaseda. Oura received requests from aquariums and research institutions across Japan asking for the bones.

But strong winds and decomposition of the carcasses prevented workers from lifting the roughly 15-ton whales by crane onto dump trucks for transportation to the burial site in Kaseda.

To prevent the whale remains from drifting after they are dumped, the town is considering attaching weights to them, they added.

Fourteen sperm whales beached at Oura last Tuesday, but rescuers managed to return only one to the open sea the following day.

01-29-2002, 01:42 PM	#2
Undertoad Radical Centrist Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Cottage of Prussia Posts: 31,423	Followup: http://home.kyodo.co.jp/all/display.jsp?an=20020128190 KAGOSHIMA, Jan. 28, Kyodo - The town hall in Oura, Kagoshima Prefecture formally decided Monday to dispose at sea the carcasses of 12 sperm whales that beached there last Tuesday and later died, town officials said. The move comes after the municipality only managed to haul one whale to a burial site of 13 whales that beached and later died. Oura will wait for strong winds to calm before dumping the carcasses in the East China Sea about 13 kilometers off the cape of Noma in the town of Kasasa, Kagoshima Prefecture, they said. Town officials earlier said they wanted to transfer the skeletons of the whales to aquariums two to three years after their burial at a beach in the neighboring city of Kaseda. Oura received requests from aquariums and research institutions across Japan asking for the bones. But strong winds and decomposition of the carcasses prevented workers from lifting the roughly 15-ton whales by crane onto dump trucks for transportation to the burial site in Kaseda. To prevent the whale remains from drifting after they are dumped, the town is considering attaching weights to them, they added. Fourteen sperm whales beached at Oura last Tuesday, but rescuers managed to return only one to the open sea the following day.