Coastal waters from Mendocino to Bay Area turning into a graveyard for gray whales

THE 40-FOOT MALE GRAY WHALE on RCA Beach had drifted past Tiburon on March 28, slid through the Golden Gate on a strong tide, and washed ashore in Bolinas the night of April 1. By the next afternoon, a team from the Marine Mammal Center and the California Academy of Sciences was on the sand in waders and elbow-length gloves, racing the next tide for samples — bone saws and meat hooks against the foul stench one writer compared to “a refrigerator left for weeks without power.”

They were looking for trauma.