[imagesource:u/Dr Mickster/Reddit]

Some in Cape Town awoke on Sunday morning to an extraordinary and surreal spectacle: a massive humpback whale embarking on an unlikely and final journey, as it was transported from Hout Bay through the leafy avenues of Constantia.

The creature had met its end off the Kommetjie coastline on Saturday morning, per News24, and then towed with great effort to the Hout Bay Harbour, where it was loaded on a truck for its final journey.

Officials intervened not out of awe for the creature’s grandeur but out of necessity—to ensure the massive creature wouldn’t land on the shore and create a problem. They acted swiftly to stave off the menace of prowling sharks and the inevitable stench that would soon haunt the popular coastline.

Apparently, it took Cape Town authorities 36 hours to successfully dispose of a humpback whale’s carcass, which is said to have been 14.8 metres long, weighing around 35 tonnes.

“We asked the NSRI and they kindly agreed to tow it to Hout Bay harbour. It was a humpback whale,” said City of Cape Town coastal manager Gregg Oelofse.

“It took most of Saturday for the carcass to be towed to Hout Bay harbour, where it was dragged up the slipway, left there overnight, and loaded up on a flatbed truck for disposal at Vissershok [landfill site on the N7] this morning,” said Oelofse.

Then it was dragged through the suburbs leaving everyone’s jaws on the floor in its wake:

Saw a huge whale carcass being transported. Took me a while to actually clock what it was pic.twitter.com/0heGbOP4t7

— mamakhe (@ZandiTee) November 17, 2024

@tazzy_neem0 humpback whale in transit #humpbackwhale #houtbay #constantianeck #beachedwhale #capetown ♬ original sound – 🍉 Finding NeemO 🍉

Locals took to social media to share the strange scene, per IOL, with Facebook user Kate Gerber-Furmie explaining, “The reason they (the City) remove dead whales from the beach is because when they decompose, their bellies distend with gas and then explode, sending whale pieces for miles.”

It may sound ripped straight from the pages of a nature documentary—or perhaps the chaotic climax of a science fiction thriller—but exploding whale carcasses are a grim reality. Leaving them to linger on the beach isn’t just unpleasant; it’s a ticking biological time bomb waiting to unleash chaos.

Reddit user u/Mightbealpharius, echoing Gerber-Furmie, commented that “they are typically moved to designated landfills or processed for research or other educational purposes.”

Image: Alistair Downing / Facebook

Whale strandings, as it happens, are not uncommon along South Africa’s shores, particularly in the Western Cape. These gentle giants may find themselves cast ashore for myriad reasons—navigational errors, the inexorable pull of old age, or desperate attempts to flee the relentless pursuit of orcas.

Just this month, the coastline bore witness to this tragedy twice more: two whales found near Cape St Martin and another grim discovery in Simon’s Town, a sombre reminder of the ocean’s unforgiving nature and the perils of climate change.

[source:news24&iol]