Hawaii just can’t get rid of an enormous dead sperm whale that’s stinking up beaches

What do you do with a stinky dead whale? Officials in Hawaii thought they had a solution when they towed a sperm whale carcass to sea Jan. 15 to decompose, Hawaii News Now reported.

But now the dead whale washed back ashore Saturday on a different Hawaiian beach, The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported.

Visitors are warned to avoid the Campbell Industrial Park area on Oahu because of sharks and bacteria while officials try to figure out what to do, the publication reported. The whale’s stench can be smelled as far away as Barbers Point Beach Park about a half-mile away, The Star-Advertiser said.

The whale first showed up off Oahu on Jan. 10, where tiger sharks were reportedly feasting on the carcass, Fox News reported.

When the body drifted into shallow waters off Sand Island State Recreation Area, state officials towed it 15 miles out to sea to finish decomposing naturally, the Hawaii Department of Land and Natural Resources wrote on Facebook.

The carcass made international headlines when shark researchers encountered a 20-foot great white shark, believed to be famed giant shark Deep Blue, feeding on the body while it was out to sea, The Associated Press reported.

Hawaii state officials also reported that swimmers were stealing teeth from the dead whale and released a video of one swimmer climbing onto the floating carcass and walking around while it was out to sea.

“The video of this man standing on top of the carcass is a clear violation of the law and it is also extremely culturally disrespectful,” said Jason Redulla, chief of the division of conservation and resources enforcement, according to the Department of Land and Natural Resources post on Facebook.

Whales are considered sacred in Hawaiian tradition and disturbing a dead whale can be a desecration, department officials wrote on Facebook.

Now that the carcass has returned to shore, researchers from a University of Hawaii lab that studies whale strandings are taking samples while state officials come up with a plan to get it off the beach a second time, The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported.

“Our team is just gonna take advantage of the fact that we have an opportunity to learn about sperm whales through that process,” said Kristi West, according to the publication.

This story was originally published January 28, 2019 at 9:21 AM.