Efforts to free a blue whale who became entangled in a heavy fishing line attached to a buoy in the channel between Catalina Island and the Palos Verdes Peninsula are expected to resume this weekend.
The distressed behemoth was spotted at 1:30 p.m. Friday by the passengers of a whale-watching vessel.
Initial rescue efforts included members of Marine Animal Rescue aboard an inflatable power boat attaching a second line and a larger buoy to the first.
Los Angeles County Lifeguards also responded and a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration disentanglement team was dispatched, officials said.
The effort to cut the whale free was suspended late Friday amid dangerous conditions as nightfall approached, officials said.
Harbor Breeze Cruises founder and boat captain Dan Salas said the tangled whale was spotted during one of the company’s cruises done in partnership with the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach.
Whale watchers first saw the leviathan — estimated to be about 75-feet long — about five miles south of the Point Fermin Lighthouse in San Pedro. It was pulling about 300 feet of line attached to a buoy, Salas said.
“We’ve seen a lot of blue whales these past few months, and everything seemed ordinary at first, but then our captain noticed the whale was dragging a buoy,” said Salas, who has been in the whale-watching business since 1990. “We immediately notified the Coast Guard and NOAA, and our captain stayed with the whale.”
Salas said the whale was swimming, diving for the krill it feeds on and breathing regularly, although it was moving more slowly as the day progressed.
Blue whales are the largest mammals on earth and are thought to be the largest mammals to have ever lived on the planet.
