DEAD WHALE FOUND ON TRAMORE  STRAND

Reporter -:  Lee Whitehouse(age 9)

From early on St. Stephen's morning, December 26th., 1997 until dusk, young and old come in large numbers to see the huge mammal, which had been washed ashore during the storms,which lashed the coast of Ireland over the previous few days. I first became aware of this event as I lay in my bed on Stephens night, listening to the local radio station WLR FM. As I lay there full of the excitement of all the happenings of Christmas, I could'nt help wondering about this news story. I could hear the wind howling outside my window. There was a storm out there alright. The rain pelted off the window so hard I found it hard to get to sleep.I tossed and turned all night thinking about this whale and how it got there.

A hundred and one questions raced through my brain. I just had to see this creature for myself. I got up early the next morning full of excitement on what lay ahead of me. I ran into my Dad's bedroom and said "Dad, there is a whale on the beach, let's go". He was'nt in the best of form, as it was only 7.00 o'clock in the morning. He told me to go back to bed for myself. I went into him again soon after that and shook him to get up. He got up very slowly and got dressed .We had a quick breakfast and I then phoned my cousins to tell them the big news . I told them to bring their video camera to capture the scene on the beach. I told them to be ready in five minutes and that we would pick them up on our way to the beach

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I went with my brother Owen and my cousin Ashley, my Dad and my Uncle Thomas. We hurried to the beach, as we were full of wonder and excitement on what we might see there. We had to walk through lanes and fields to reach our destination. At last we got there and I just stood still looking in amazement at the sight of this huge mammal lying there in front of our eyes. My uncle had his video camera and he asked us to stand beside the whale, while he video taped us. We also walked carefully all the way up an down the 60ft. whale and we looked very small compared to its huge size. We were very excited at the wonder of it all. The people of Tramore are hopeful that in time the skeleton will be on view in our  local museum. We don't have a museum at the moment but people are hoping to convert the old railway station into one. Looking over our beautiful three mile beach and the great Atlantic ocean, we were pleased to have witnessed the occasion.

The Fin-whale is the second biggest whale in the world. It must have been dead long before it hit the beach. It's tongue was huge. A man was eating crisps and the next thing he rubbed the tongue of the whale and continued to eat his crisps. Later on that day he felt very ill and he had to go to hospital.
The doctors had no idea what was wrong with him as he was getting sick all the time. It seems that he picked up a disease from the whales tongue. He was lucky. .The fin whale grows up to 80 feet  (24meters) long and lives in all the oceans. They are black on top and whitish below. My Granny helped me with this story. My uncle Thomas took the photographs. I scanned them  in school myself with the help of Edward Battye. Don't forget to read more on the life of the Fin Whale on the next page.

Lee Whitehouse.