A “worrying” sighting of a suspected Sowerby’s beaked whale close to Britain’s coastline has been captured on camera.
The mysterious creature emerged beside a passenger ferry shortly after it left the mouth of the Fowey estuary in Cornwall.
Footage taken by skipper Toni Dowrick shows the animal cutting through the water before disappearing beneath the surface.
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Marine-stranding volunteers who examined the footage believe it could have been a Sowerby’s beaked whale – an elusive deep-sea species rarely observed alive and seldom seen so close to shore, as reported by What’s The Jam.
Toni was travelling aboard the Mevagissey to Fowey Ferry when the remarkable encounter happened on 4 October.
She said fellow skipper Steve first noticed a disturbance and stopped the boat by placing its engine in neutral.
Toni told Jam Press: “We were just leaving the estuary mouth of Fowey, headed to Mevagissey.
“The skipper at the time, Steve, said: ‘I don’t know what the hell I’ve just seen, but it was quite a surface disturbance.’
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“He stopped and we asked the passengers to keep an eye on the water.
“Within a few seconds, ‘something’ appeared again, heading right for the ferry.
“I recorded just after it swam across the stern and headed south, which was along our port side.”
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The crew initially wondered whether they had encountered a bottlenose dolphin or a juvenile minke whale.
Toni said: “The whole time, we were deliberating about what it actually was that we were observing.
“Your brain only has a split second to process what you’re looking at before it disappears.
“You say what you see – a beak on something that looks like a whale.”
Toni sent the footage to her aunt and her aunt’s partner, who volunteer with marine-stranding organisations.
They suggested the animal could be a Sowerby’s beaked whale, prompting Toni to report the encounter to British Divers Marine Life Rescue and marine-stranding specialists in Cornwall.
She said: “When I realised how rare that was, I reported it immediately.
“Dan Jarvis, head of South West Marine Strandings, gave me a call and we talked through further monitoring and, of course, the worrying nature of this sighting.”
Sowerby’s beaked whales are normally associated with deep, cold waters around the edge of the North Atlantic continental shelf.
They can reach approximately 5.5 metres – or 18ft – and hunt fish and squid during prolonged dives.
The secretive animals spend relatively little time at the surface, making encounters at sea uncommon.
Their presence in shallow coastal water can raise concerns that an animal is sick, injured or disorientated.
Mr Jarvis, of British Divers Marine Life Rescue, told the BBC the whales “shouldn’t be anywhere near our coast” because the water is too shallow and outside their regular habitat.
Toni said there had been military activity in the bay during the preceding week, leading those involved to question whether sonar could have affected the animal.
However, there is no evidence that sonar was involved, and no link has been established between the activity and this particular sighting.
The Mammal Society and Whale and Dolphin Conservation both identify underwater noise, including naval sonar, as a potential threat to Sowerby’s beaked whales.
Toni added: “It’s that or the whale is sick and may well strand.
“As there have been no further sightings, we are hopeful that it has returned to its usual territory.
“We all realise what a rare and special sighting this was – especially for a little passenger ferry.”
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