Today was a shocking and tragic Sunday for the kids and me (my
husband was not with us). Our usual routine of church was followed by a trip
across Lake Washington to the West Seattle Ferry terminal. The draw of the
Puget Sound is strong for us as we enjoy the intricacies of Northwest costal
life.
When we got to the ferry the workers immediately told us
about a sad event.
A whale had died nearby.
The kids and I quickly got out of our car and ran to the
rail of the ferry terminal bridge. It was there where our hearts sank deep - deeper
than the deepest parts of the Sound. My son said with vigor, “It’s a real whale,
Mom.” Looking out, we saw a beautiful humpback whale that was beached on the
shore, dead.
We had seen a dead grey whale in the middle of the Sound on a
ferry trip in May. It seemed unbelievable to all of us that another whale would die in
almost the same place. In my lifetime I had never seen a dead whale in the Sound
and to see two in three months seemed impossible.
Initially, I thought this whale seemed smaller than I would
expect for a full-grown humpback. A biologist came by and said that this whale
was only about one to two years old. She called it a juvenile whale. It’s
beautiful mouth and body with white flippers and black fin shone in the overcast
sun.
Later, I learned that before we came to the ferry dock
people had seen him stranded, struggling, and later beached. They covered the whale with wet blankets
and poured water on it. They tried to get it free into deeper waters, but to no
avail.
Fortunately, this particular type of whale is not an
endangered species as there are at least 80,000 living in our world. For that we
are thankful. Yet, there is no question
that my kids and I would have been in the water pouring water on the humpback
and trying to lead him to deeper waters had we found it struggling.
The plight of nature is hard and sometimes makes us sad. We
fight to make a raw, pure, and clean environment in a world of toxins, waste, and plastic refuse in our waters. We fight for this because we are so grateful for our mutual
life together with nature here on earth.
To say the least, my kids and I looked
out at that humpback whale with true ambition for the Puget Sound to flourish and not
perish like this beautiful one!
