[Mb-civic] The Whale Coroner - Keith O'Brien - Boston Globe

[William Swiggard]

The Whale Coroner
When 40 feet and 80 tons of mammal turns up dead, whether it's in the 
middle of the ocean surrounded by sharks or on the shore surrounded by 
gaping beachgoers, Michael Moore gets the call.

By Keith O'Brien  |  October 2, 2005

One of the important things you need to know before dissecting a dead 
whale is how to handle a knife - a really big knife. Depending on the 
condition of the carcass, other necessities may include an excavator or 
backhoe, chains, sharp 3-foot-long Japanese whaling hooks, and someone 
who's not afraid to stand on top of a dead whale floating in the middle 
of the ocean surrounded by circling sharks. In New England, veterinarian 
and marine-mammal biologist Michael Moore is that man.

"There's only a handful of folks who can take apart a whale the way 
Michael does," says Katie Touhey, a marine-mammal biologist and director 
of the Cape Cod Stranding Network, a nonprofit organization that 
responds when whales, dolphins, and seals - dead or alive - wash up on 
the beach. "I know how to take apart a whale, but not like Michael."

Few do. But it's part of Moore's job as a research specialist at the 
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, where he's worked since 1986. 
Recently, he figured out how to use an ultrasound machine to measure the 
body fat of female whales. One of his long-term efforts has been to 
track the effects of sewage in Boston Harbor on the health of winter 
flounder. Curiosity and related research got him interested in whale 
necropsies. He learned the trade by watching. And by the late 1990s, he 
was the necropsy team leader.

When a 37-foot humpback whale washed up on Duxbury Beach in October 
2001, there was Moore, sawing it open. When an even bigger sperm whale 
turned up dead in Nantucket the following summer, there was Moore again, 
taking it apart bone by bone. And when an endangered right whale turns 
up dead just about anywhere on the East Coast, you can bet that Moore 
will be there, trying to find out why.

That's what the work is about: finding answers. From the carcasses, 
Moore figures out how these whales lived and why they died, whether it 
was from an infection, a tumor, or a run-in with a ship or fishing net. 
And this information, unearthed from tons of blubber, helps academics, 
research scientists, fisheries managers, environmental scientists, and 
governments understand what's happening to whales in the North Atlantic.

It isn't glamorous work, but Moore doesn't care. He's a 
sandals-and-shorts kind of guy. Hair mussed. A wry smile on his face. 
He's a 49-year-old Englishman, educated at Cambridge University, and he 
still has his accent. But he married a woman from Massachusetts 21 years 
ago and moved to her home on a small island just off the coast, part of 
the seaside town of Marion. There, from time to time, the phone will 
ring with news of a dead whale. And Moore will take a boat to the 
mainland, climb in his truck, and go.

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2005/10/02/the_whale_coroner/
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