Berhampur: A giant whale shark died a few hours after it was washed ashore on Sunapur beach under Chikiti block in Odisha’s Ganjam district on Sunday.
According to sources, some local fishermen found a 22-feet long whale shark struggling on the seashore at 4 pm. Following information, other fishermen and locals from nearby areas rushed to the beach and tried to push the shark into deep waters. It was, however, found dead on the shore at 7 pm.
The Forest Department later seized the carcass. The postmortem will be conducted on Monday.
It may be mentioned here that a similar incident had taken place at Gopalpur coast on February 19 when local fishermen had managed to push a whale shark into the deep waters after it was caught in the fishing net during deep sea fishing.
