1 000s flock to whale funeral
2007-08-15 16:02
Hanoi - Nearly 1 000 people in a fishing village in central Vietnam held a solemn funeral on Wednesday to bury a 19-ton whale washed to the shore, an official said.
Villagers burned incense and paper money and gave offerings of fruit to the whale's spirit in the ceremony in Vinh Loc commune in Thua Thien-Hue province, 600km south of Hanoi.
The whale, 15 meters long, was found caught in a shallow-water net of local fishermen on Tuesday morning, according to commune official Nguyen Van Minh.
"The whale was still alive when it was found yesterday but was too weak to swim and it died shortly after that," Minh said.
Vietnamese fishermen consider the appearance of a whale, dead or alive, a good omen for a fishing season and funerals for whales washed ashore are a tradition in many coastal areas.
After the whale died on Tuesday, hundreds of people worked to pull it to shore with ropes for the funeral but could not move the animal, the official said.
"This is the largest ever whale that we have seen," Minh said. "It has dark skin and a long and pointed mouth."
A tugboat was called out to pull the whale to the nearby Chan May Port, where it was lifted onto a container truck by crane and taken to a burial site.
Last month, another whale weighing 15 tons was washed dead to the shore of southern Binh Thuan province, 200km north of Ho Chi Minh City, and a similar funeral was held.
- Sapa-dpa
- SAPA