Dead whale – full of fishing nets and plastic bags

A sperm whale washed ashore in Hawaii this weekend probably died partly because it had eaten vast numbers of fishing nets, plastic bags and other marine litter, according to researchers.

Kristi West, head of the Institute of Marine Biology at the University of Hawaii says that the whale, 17 metres long and weighing 54 tonnes, had so many foreign objects in the opening to its intestines that it would have been difficult for food to get in.

“The presence of undigested fish and cephalopods is additional evidence of a blockage,” says West in a statement.