OSU's Marine Mammal Institute tells us, that in 2015 the carcass of a blue whale washed ashore near Gold Beach, Oregon.

The event was so rare that the last known beached blue whale was more than 200 years ago.

Researchers from the Marine Mammal Institute saw the carcass as an opportunity for study and education.

After examining and dismantling the carcass, researchers bundled the remains of the skeleton in huge nets and submerged them in Yaquina Bay, where seawater and marine invertebrates cleaned the remains.

The skeleton was in the water for more than three years before being removed in November 2019. The original plan to clean and restore the skeleton was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic but work is now resuming.

This week the bones travel to Alberta, Canada so that a team of preservation and restoration specialists can prepare it for public display at Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport.

Oregon State’s Marine Mammal Institute has contracted with Alberta, Canada-based Dinosaur Valley Studios to complete the cleaning and preservation of the bones and build a permanent display for them.

“The skeleton of this whale presents an extraordinary educational opportunity for students and researchers and an awe-inspiring experience for all visitors to the Oregon Coast,” said Lisa T. Ballance, director of the Marine Mammal Institute, which is part of OSU’s College of Agricultural Sciences. “We are thrilled to begin this next phase of the preservation and display process.”

The team will preserve the bones and build a steel display structure to hold the articulated skeleton. The design uses an external cradle system and requires no drilling, leaving the bones intact and available for study by researchers, Hadfield said.

Hadfield and his team have preserved other whale skeletons and the 24-foot skull of a blue whale, but this will be the group’s first complete blue whale skeleton.

For more information on the campaign, “Help us build a whale,” visit: beav.es/bones.