The results have been released and they confirm what the specialists suspected.
The orca who found himself in difficulty in the Seine at the end of May, between Rouen and Le Havre, died "of inanition (state of weakness caused by the fact that the animal has stopped eating)", confirms this Wednesday in a press release the prefect of Seine-Maritime.
This is already what was suspected even before the conclusions of the necropsy just unveiled.
The death of the cetacean is "not directly linked to its passage in the Seine", details the press release, but the cessation of food would rather be linked to "the isolation of the animal, which usually evolves and hunts in band ".
Press release - đ Killer whale in Seine-Maritime: Results of analyzes and necropsy â€”ïž pic.twitter.com/3EGGtyJwl3
â Prefect of Normandy and Seine-Maritime (@Prefet76) July 6, 2022
In addition to the cause of death, the analyzes show that the animal was an âimmatureâ female of 4.26 m, weighing 1,100 kg and who âpresented a poor physical conditionâ.
Its stomach, which contained only âa few claws (âŠ) sealâ shows that the cetacean had not fed ârecentlyâ.
Traces of a bullet in the head
The necropsy also showed that what was on the animal's skin was not "mucormycosis" (a rare fungus potentially transmissible to humans) but "a common fungus present in fresh water, which cannot be the cause of the animal's death.
VIDEO.
âIt is of major scientific interestâ: in the laboratory of the Natural History Museum which prepares the orca of the Seine
Above all, the analyzes revealed âthe presence of ammunition (âŠ) at the base of the animal's skullâ.
But they did not make it possible to determine the date of the shooting.
"It may therefore be an injury suffered by the animal a few weeks or even several months earlier," the statement said, adding that the public prosecutor of Rouen had been informed.
On Twitter, the NGO Sea Shepherd France announces that it will file a complaint against X for "attempt to destroy a protected species".
