Watch as the skeleton of a 70-foot blue whale is assembled into a display at Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport, Oregon. The massive, 5,500 pound skeleton and the steel support system built for it were assembled over six days in May 2026, with most of the bones being placed individually by hand by a three-person team from Alberta, Canada-based Dinosaur Valley Studios.
The skeleton is one of only a handful of blue whale skeletons available for public viewing in North America, and the only one between Vancouver, British Columbia, and the San Francisco Bay area. Blue whales – the largest animals ever to live – are endangered. Because they live primarily in the deep ocean, they are rarely visible to the public and tend to sink when they die.
When the whale’s body was discovered near Gold Beach, Oregon, in 2015, leaders of OSU’s Marine Mammal Institute recognized a rare opportunity to turn an unfortunate loss into a resource for learning and discovery, and now that vision has become reality.
Ethan Shaw
(707)-621-0989
No comments:
Post a Comment