2 Rare Blue Whales Sighted Off CT Coast In Sea Canyon

CONNECTICUT —They are the largest creatures on the planet. And they eat the smallest of them.

Blue whales, which can grow up to 100 feet long and weigh up to 140 tons, are endangered and just a few hundred remain the Atlantic Ocean. The sighting earlier this month of two blue whales off the Connecticut coast is huge. No pun intended.

In mid-February, researchers flew over the the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument. In the first few minutes, New England Aquarium researchers Orla O’Brien and Amy Warren spotted a group of 50 bottlenose dolphins and then, the first of two blue whales — the first blue whale directly over the monument’s Oceanographer Canyon, a 4,000-foot canyon, the deepest in the underwater national park.

While blue whales are known to frequent areas where deep canyons intersect with continental shelf edges, this sighting was important because the blue whale population in the Northwest Atlantic is thought to be only around 250 animals.

The New England Aquarium’s survey aerial team has flown this area for three years, but this survey was the first one conducted in winter months, so they did not know what they would discover.

Six hours in, the team had counted 322 whales and dolphins, as well as pilot, fin, sei, humpback, sperm, and Sowerby’s beaked whales. Also during the flight, the team also saw groups of striped dolphins with calves and sperm whales that can dive underwater for as long as 45 minutes.

But it was the rare sighting of endangered blue whales that was most surprising.

Blue whale/Photos courtesy of the New England Aquarium

Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument

The only marine national monument is a "hotspot of biodiversity on the edge of the continental shelf where the shallow seas off New England drop sharply into the deep waters of the northwestern Atlantic."

“The marine monument is such an important area,” said O’Brien. “It plays a critical role in the life history of so many species of whales and dolphins that come here with their calves to find food. As marine mammal researchers, it’s such a thrill to fly in this area and see such a great diversity of animals.”