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Blue whale skeleton at New Bedford museum still oozing oil

(www.wpri.com)
201 points geox | 1 comments | 17 Oct 24 23:09 UTC | HN request time: 0.774s | source
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poulsbohemian ◴[19 Oct 24 17:55 UTC] No.41889361[source]▶
Ok I'm going to come out and say it because I think multiple people in this thread have hinted at the same confusion: What bloody kind of oil are we talking about here? Whale oil, that somehow was captured in the bones? Petroleum oil from the whale's encounter with the tanker? They basically buried the lede on this story and nowhere appear to explain why this particular whale is dripping some kind of "oil" that seemingly other museum example don't experience. So - anyone got any insight here?
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furyofantares ◴[19 Oct 24 18:29 UTC] No.41889611[source]▶
It's a mixture of fats. Think olive oil, fish oil, the oils your skin excretes.
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poulsbohemian ◴[19 Oct 24 18:38 UTC] No.41889672[source]▶
That could be - but my point is the article doesn't make it clear what kind of oil we're talking about, and as you note - the oil would come from the fats, so why is it excreting from the bones? IE: wouldn't all the potential oil have been removed when they prepared this specimen for display?
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1. pvaldes ◴[19 Oct 24 19:17 UTC] No.41889964[source]▶
My bet is that largest bones here are just too big and find some recipient where to cook them was impossible.

But both whale fat and petrol oil are possible here. Maybe the whale died by a black tide and was floating some time before to be scooped by the ship. Fin whales type are fast cetaceans and crashing with a ship is not so usual like in other cetaceans. Not unless is an ill animal.