Budhdist monks perform religious rituals for a 40ft long whale which washed up on the coast of Thailand.<br /><br />The 15 tonne carcass emerged from the Gulf of Thailand in Samut Prakan, 30km south of Bangkok on Sunday (January 26).<br /><br />Researchers identified it as a six-year-old femaleBryde's whale, or Bruda whale, which had been dead for around five days before it surfaced in mangrove forest in the Bang Poo district.<br /><br />Four monks from the Wat Tamru temple performed traditional Buddhist rites for the dead whale on Monday (January 27).<br /><br />While in the afternoon, staff from the Marine and Coastal Resources Department performed an autopsy on the carcass to find the cause of death. <br /><br />Meat was stripped from the whale's skeleton and placed on a canvas sheet. They will then try to identify from the whale's DNA if it was from a family of 50 similar whales in the Gulf of Thailand.<br /><br />Chalatip Chanchompu, director of the country's sea research centre, said the whale had no signs of major external injuries but its second right rib bone was broken.<br /><br />There was also a bruise on the right side of the chin area, which they believe came from an impact before the whale died.<br /><br />The scientists will keep the whale's bones for educational purposes. <br /><br />Chalatip said: "The whale's body will be buried but we will gather her bones and keep them for research at the centre. The tissue will decompose in around two years."
