Overview
- The Marine Mammal Center reported two additional dead gray whales in San Francisco Bay, with sightings near Tiburon and Point San Pablo, which the group said doubled the number that have washed up this year.
- One carcass is being towed to Angel Island for a necropsy to determine how it died, though a separate whale wedged at the Phillips 66 refinery could not be examined because teams could not access it.
- The recent deaths followed an earlier discovery near the Golden Gate Bridge, bringing the tally to at least three in about a week across the Bay and nearby shoreline.
- Center staff said late March through May is the peak for local strandings as migrating gray whales rest and feed in the bay’s busy shipping and ferry lanes, which increases the chance of vessel strikes.
- Officials are developing a Whale Smart training pilot for commercial operators to reduce strikes, a push that comes as the West Coast gray whale population is estimated at about 12,900, the lowest since the 1970s.