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Creature that washed up on New Zealand beach may be world’s rarest whale — a spade-toothed whale
Wellington, New Zealand — Spade-toothed whales are the world’s rarest, with no live sightings ever recorded. No one knows how many there are, what they eat, or even where they live in the vast expanse of the southern Pacific Ocean. However, scientists in New Zealand may have finally caught a break.
The country’s conservation agency said Monday a creature that washed up on a South Island beach this month is believed to be a spade-toothed whale. The five-meter-long creature, a type of beaked whale, was identified after it washed ashore on Otago beach from its color patterns and the shape of its skull, beak and teeth
“We know very little, practically nothing” about the creatures, Hannah Hendriks, Marine Technical Advisor for the Department of Conservation, told The Associated Press. “This is going to lead to some amazing science and world-first information.”
Department of Conservation / AP
If the cetacean is confirmed to be the elusive spade-toothed whale, it would be the first specimen found in a state that would permit scientists to dissect it, allowing them to map the relationship of the whale to the few others of the species found and learn what it eats and perhaps lead to clues about where they live.
Only six other spade-toothed whales have ever been pinpointed, and those found intact on New Zealand’s North Island beaches had been buried before DNA testing could verify their identification, Hendriks said, thwarting any chance to study them.
This time, the beached whale was quickly transported to cold storage and researchers will work with local Māori iwi (tribes) to plan how it will be examined, the conservation agency said.
New Zealand’s Indigenous people consider whales a taonga – a sacred treasure – of cultural significance. In April, Pacific Indigenous leaders signed a treaty recognizing whales as “legal persons,” although such a declaration is not reflected in the laws of participating nations.
Nothing is currently known about the whales’ habitat. The creatures deep-dive for food and likely surface so rarely that it has been impossible to narrow their location further than the southern Pacific Ocean, home to some of the world’s deepest ocean trenches, Hendriks said.
Department of Conservation / AP
“It’s very hard to do research on marine mammals if you don’t see them at sea,” she said. “It’s a bit of a needle in a haystack. You don’t know where to look.”
The conservation agency said the genetic testing to confirm the whale’s identification could take months.
It took “many years and a mammoth amount of effort by researchers and local people” to identify the “incredibly cryptic” mammals, Kirsten Young, a senior lecturer at the University of Exeter who has studied spade-toothed whales, said in emailed remarks.
The fresh discovery “makes me wonder – how many are out in the deep ocean and how do they live?” Young said.
The first spade-toothed whale bones were found in 1872 on New Zealand’s Pitt Island. Another discovery was made at an offshore island in the 1950s, and the bones of a third were found on Chile’s Robinson Crusoe Island in 1986. DNA sequencing in 2002 proved that all three specimens were of the same species – and that it was one distinct from other beaked whales.
Researchers studying the mammal couldn’t confirm if the species went extinct. Then in 2010, two whole spade-toothed whales, both dead, washed up on a New Zealand beach. Firstly mistaken for one of New Zealand’s 13 other more common types of beaked whale, tissue samples – taken after they were buried – revealed them as the enigmatic species.
New Zealand is a whale-stranding hotspot, with more than 5,000 episodes recorded since 1840, according to the Department of Conservation.
TEERAYUT CHAISARN/Getty Images
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Prosecutors in Argentina have charged three people in connection with the death of former One Direction singer Liam Payne, officials said on Thursday.
Payne, 31, died on October 16 when he fell from a balcony of the Casa Sur Palermo hotel in Buenos Aires.
One person, who authorities say spent time with Payne every day while he was in Buenos Aires, is charged with abandonment of a person followed by death, a charge that carries a sentence of five to 15 years in prison, according to a news release from Argentina’s National Criminal and Correctional Prosecutor’s Office released Thursday.
Natacha Pisarenko / AP
The other two charged are accused of supplying Payne with drugs, including cocaine, and have been charged with two acts each of supplying narcotics. Officials did not say what the sentence for those charges could be.
One of the people charged with supplying narcotics is a hotel employee, the prosecutor’s office said. The three people charged have been notified of the charges, the prosecutor’s office said, and have been prohibited from leaving the country.
None of the suspects were identified by name.
The release also stated that Payne died from a fall, and had not jumped from the balcony. Officials had not previously confirmed which version of events had happened, but the prosecutor’s office said that Payne was likely “not fully conscious or was experiencing a state of noticeable decrease or loss of consciousness” at the time of the fall.
“For the prosecution, this situation would also rule out the possibility of a conscious or voluntary act on the part of the victim,” the prosecutor’s office said.
The investigation included nine raids on homes in the region and dozens of interviews with hotel staff, Payne’s family and friends and experts in the fields of medicine, biochemistry and psychiatry, the prosecutor’s office said. Investigators also reviewed more than 800 hours of video footage from the hotel and public roads and conducted a forensic analysis of Payne’s cell phone to review his digital footprint in the period leading up to his death.
An autopsy was also conducted. After that, Payne’s body was returned to his father, Geoff Payne, who had been in Argentina since the day after his son’s death.
Toxicology tests conducted as part of the autopsy showed that Payne “only had traces” of drug use in his system. There were “traces” of alcohol, cocaine and a prescription antidepressant, the prosecutor’s office said. Medical experts found that Payne only had injuries from his fall.
All of the information gathered by investigators was summarized into a 180-page report presented to Judge Laura Bruniard, who oversees criminal cases. Bruniard approved the charges against the three people, but the investigation will continue, the prosecutor’s office said, as investigators continue to try to access Payne’s other personal devices.
