Entangled North Atlantic Right Whale sighted off Shippagan, NB – Halifax

The Federal Department of Fisheries is on the lookout for an entangled North Atlantic Right Whale in the Gulf of St. Lawrence near Shippagan, NB

The department says the whale was spotted by a Fisheries and Oceans Canada plane on Saturday.

The whale, identified as the 2021 calf of the whale known as 3720, was sighted about 48 nautical miles east of Shippagan.

Officials said they didn’t know what type of gear the whale was caught in or where it came from. Taking to Twitter, Fisheries and Oceans Canada said the whale was “entangled behind its tail, with buoys and ropes behind it.”

Marine wildlife response teams are on standby and, conditions permitting, efforts will be made to disentangle the whale if it is sighted again.

The last known sighting of the animal was in March 2022 off the coast of Provincetown, MA.

Late last month, officials said another entangled whale – nicknamed the Snow Cone – had been sighted between northern New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island.

There are only about 336 North Atlantic right whales left in the world, and breeding females are being closely followed by scientists.

— With a file from The Canadian Press