The Dollop with Dave Anthony and Gareth Reynolds - 227 - Whalesplosion

Episode Date: December 15, 2016

Comedians @daveanthony and @reynoldsgareth examine the Oregon whalesplosion. SOURCES TOUR DATES REDBUBBLE MERCH 

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week. I Dave Anthony read a story from American History to my very tired friend Gareth Reynolds who has no idea what the topic is going to be about. Are you regretting not doing two on on Sunday now? No that was that had to happen yeah yeah this is fine. Small ups I like I like a little small small ups like a little me time you know there's not we don't I don't need to worry about like you know there's not like multiple people it's just like this dude tried to live in a volcano and I'm like let's have let's go. Oh my god did you see the title? Oh man it's about a guy living in a volcano. Yummy yummy yummy. Do you want

to look who to do? I'll do one bottle. People say this is funny. Not Gary Gareth. Dave okay. Someone or something is tickling people. Is it for fun? And this is not gonna come to Tickly podcast. Okay. You are queen fakie of made-up town. All hell queen shit of Liesville. A bunch of religious virgins go to mingle and do what? Pray. Hi Gary. No I said done my friend. November 9th 1970. Okay. You're gonna know this one. Okay and by the way don't ever assume I'm gonna know. No you're gonna know this one. Okay. I know the world you live in. Okay well all right okay. This is about. This is about the

two quarries. An eight ton 45 foot long sperm whale which had been dead for dead for a while washed up on the beach just south of Florence Oregon which is right smack dab in the middle of the Oregon coast. This is I this is the best. When the whale washed up the local residents and tourists were curious as one would be seeing a humongous corpse. Sure. But pretty soon it was it was discovered it was Marlon Brando on vacation. It was Brando. Pretty soon it was an odorous nightmare. The death odor of rotting whale a wafted through the dunes and the town. Yeah you did that's what you don't prepare yourself. No. The

the amount of rotting. I don't think you ever get used to the odor of death no matter what what you're doing. But also like a fishy fishy death like I I still like if I when I you know walk through like a fish market area of anything oh still like I'm never I've never been down with that rotting fish yeah so but that's fresh fish yeah so rotting fish yeah real bad. In Oregon the beach is a public right away so the state highway department was responsible for cleaning it up. Okay so is there anything in the highway handbook about how to deal with whale bodies? How much of the train for that? Right it feels like the new

territory maybe. Turn to chapter 18 whale bodies. Are we ever gonna need this? Nah we'll skip this one. Yeah. Highway department. What are you thinking of Todd? Just back to school when I said something I shouldn't have. Well come on let's get this whale body out of here. God damn it. Remember chapter 18? Oh I done blown it. Highway department officials tried to figure out what to do with the dead mass for a day. It had been so many years since one had washed up in the county that no one remembered what had been done in the past. Wait so they wait this had happened before but everyone forgot. Whales wash up. Well

no one nice people might have been alive and it's not like the last guy scrawled it on wood. Well I'm always baffled. That to me would be like a no brainer thing that people would remember and have access to the solution. Not if they just left it there or buried it or whatever. Well that's not yeah if they left it there they're not solving. Right right so that would be not much to pass down. Be lazy and don't try guys. My suggestion about the dead whale is to stare at it until it's gone. Use a clothespin for your nose. It's my advice. We wear we wore clothespins for a year. I'm not carving that into the tablet it'll take

too long. George Thornton assistant district engineer said quote you can't bury it because these things have a tendency to get just get uncovered again. We were trying to find if a rendering plant would want the thing to make fertilizer but we didn't find any takers. Both kind of shocking to me that that bearing seems way more of a solution than just well and also I'm surprised that somebody wouldn't want to use I'm surprised that the some lunatic didn't want it. Right. Yeah it's like make soap or something. Or just or just Mary Mary. You're my wife well body. You met Gladys. That was me. That was me. So a

rendering plant I would just assume that it's like I don't know I mean too big or or too rotted maybe. I don't know do they care about that kind of stuff. Are they care about. I would think there are there's there's got to be places that don't give a shit about any of those things. Maybe they didn't maybe they call like two and they're like it ain't no use. What was that another prank call going to see if I want a whale body. Fuck those guys. I'm tired of the whale guys. Yeah. Must be great to work in a rendering plant though. Yeah yeah that's a dream. Then they consulted experts at the Department of the Navy. Okay. That's

when the Highway Department decided to blow up the whale. Which is so insane. No it's a great idea. How like it is just a shocking decision-making. It really is. To turn into a big mist right. That's the idea. But I mean nothing like this had been tried. Not that I know of. This is the nuclear option. I believe so. Right. So this is okay. But someone's got to try this. You know what I would say you are right if knowing us at some point somebody had to try to blow up a whale to get rid of it. Two days after the whale corpse washed up the Eugene Register Guard reported quote seagulls here will have themselves an eight ton

feast tomorrow morning. That's when the state highway crews plan to blow up the remains of a 45-foot Pacific gray whale which washed up on the beach Monday. The big whale had been dead sometime and smells very bad. That's gonna be great for if you're a reporter to get that story. But is the theory behind that is that it'll be easier for seagulls to eat? Yeah yeah the theory is that they'll blow it up in a little pieces so that seagulls not just seagulls but crabs and everything else that right okay eats off the beach that will go get food. You know I get it. Yeah I get it. No makes sense. I do. I am serious. Yeah. Here's a joke. No no I get it. Oh yeah okay. But there

are like if you said that to me I'd go well how many seagulls do you think there are? Oh you got to consult someone. How many crabs are you talking about? You have to consult someone who has access to facts. Absolutely. That is like you know the world needs dreamers but the dreamers need like a realist to remind them of like yeah but even then. You would go to marine biologists and be like hey I'm thinking about blowing up a whale on the beach do you think all the seagulls and crabs will take it all away? And he just drops like a thing of algae like that sounds really awesome. I'm in a lab most days let's blow him up for sure. Okay so

how to blow up a whale? Yeah that's not an area that has a lot of expertise. Right. There's nothing like a guy you got yellow whale blowers. Well there could be like the guy who like did it like 20 years ago but doesn't want to talk about it that you got to get out of retirement you know. Mr. Jefferson I know that you blew up that whale. I told you guys to stop coming around here. Maybe I blew up a whale maybe I didn't. Now get out of here kids. Quit calling me. And then at the right moment he's like heard you guys needed a bomb for the blow hole. He's here. Something you didn't take into account young pup. He's just in a wetsuit. Yeah

he's Chris Christopherson. Somebody need to blow up a whale. So George Thornton while just the assistant district engineer headed up what I call whale explosion. Sure sure sure. George decided to put charges under the body then blow it up. He believed at that point the whale corpse would be blasted into small pieces. Under seagulls and other beach scavengers to clean up the whale in just a few days. The big parts like bones that were left after state crews would come and clean up. Under. Yeah under. Now that to me seems like a flaw. I would think you know whatever you got to do to dig some

holes get them in it. I think I think both. Yeah I think both. Yeah I think more dynamite was the solution. All dynamite. I would say okay well we'll talk about it. Okay then someone came out and cut the whale's jawbone and teeth off during the night. Just a lunatic. I assume it was a scavenger. Sure. The seagull had enough. But the guy so that's like sitting in someone's house or. What. It's in someone's garage. Like no it still is. That's someone still has that if either in their family or it's still in someone's fucking house. I like to think it was a really drunk guy. It's had to have been. But can you imagine how hard that was.

I'm really hard. Cutting a fucking jawbone off. Not easy. I mean I've tried to do a people. Sorry. On. Ridiculous. Sorry. Then someone. Gonna need you to go back. Go ahead. Young up and coming 23 year old reporter Paul Linman of KAT Portland was given the assignment of covering whale explosion. Quote. I was getting good assignments so when they asked me to go to Florence to cover the disposal of a whale. I went well wait a minute. I'm the boy wonder here. I do bigger stories. Send somebody else. Then they said they were going to use dynamite and I said okay let's go. Okay. Who is it. What is the name of this person. Young hot shot.

Paul Linman. Okay. Paul needs to calm down a lot. No but I get it. He's the hot guy is considered a hot story. Okay. Listen. Don't you align yourself. Read back what he said. Read back what he said. Again. I was getting good assignments. So when they asked me to go to Florence to cover the disposal of a whale. I went well wait a minute. I'm boy wonder. I do bigger stories. Okay. So right there. Right. Let's put a pin in it right there. I'm boy wonder. You don't call yourself boy wonder. I think that was the thing you did back then. I don't think it was. I did not think it was. All right. Take it from boy wonder. No. No. You know what we could

do. Put his ego inside the whale because that thing's already blown up. Wow. I'm going to drop this mic gently. Yeah. So with his cameraman Doug Brazil Paul chartered a single engine plane to fly to Florence. There he borrowed the local airport manager's car and drove to the beach. So it was a different time. He borrowed the wait. It was different. It was such as the weird detail about it was 1970. Right. Landed in a small airport. You but can I use your car. Yeah. That is why that is how you know that decade is labeled cocaine. Oh yeah. Man if I take your car use it. Quote can I have sex with your wife. Have her get in there. Quote

we could smell the moment we step from the car. Not anything recognizable just this incredible stench which grew stronger as we walked up the sand dune trail towards the beach. What was boy wonder doing in such a predicament. Wow. It was putting a taste my mouth like spoiled meat only stronger. I mean you know that smell when you can taste it. Yeah. That's tough. Fuck me. Tough. Looking at the scene Paul thought they wouldn't really do that. Would they blow up a whale. Word got out about the coming whale explosion. Walter Omenhofer was in town. He was in the name convention. I'm speaking at the event. Yeah. Double name. Omenhofer. He

was an executive with the Kingsford charcoal briquette company and was in town looking for a place to build a new plant for the business. When he heard about the plans to explode a whale he went down to the beach because he had experience in demolition from his days in the military. Okay. He approached George who was working on his whale explosion placement. Walter told George he was using too much dynamite. Interesting. And George was not interested in the out of town or telling him how to blow up a whale. Interesting. But that's total like local guy. Yeah. This is how we get this. How we do it. Yeah. City

sticker. Well what's his name. What's his name. Omenhofer. Omenhofer. I mean you know. Yeah. Florida. No Florence Oregon. Oh Florence Oregon. Well way different. Yeah. Okay. So it starts with the same letters in my defense. It's all good. So he's not interested. George also told Walter he was going to have everyone on top of the dunes far away to which Walter responded quote. Yeah. I'm going to be the furthest SOB down that way. Yeah. Okay. So he's now he was you're a fucking idiot. All right buddy. He's like all right. All right. So I was going to try and help you out but you go ahead and do your dumb shit and I'll be able to be

watching and laughing. Good luck. Okay. Stupid. Bye buddy. Your brain's little. The reason. See you dumbass. Okay. Tiny head. Bye little brain. Dumb. Blur up a guy. Someone here can help. I don't want it. Bye bye. Bye. I'm actually going this way. Sorry. I don't mean to cut through again. Pardon me. Sorry. We're ripping over your dynamite. You have a little brain. The reason George was in charge is because the district engineer was away on a hunting trip. Okay. So George didn't even be in charge of this. It just. Don't you cut the trip short to blow up the whale. Call the guy.

Yeah. And you know what you totally look. Yeah. This dude is like yes. Yes. Finally. It was difficult to determine what what kind of whale it was because it was so decomposed. At first everyone thought it was a California gray whale but then after a while they realized it was a sperm whale. So that's how fucked up it was. Like they couldn't tell what kind of whale it was. I again feel like they're just not consulting any experts. Bruce Mate was a 24 year old marine biology grad student. Okay. So he came down because he saw this as an opportunity to learn about whales. Right. And he asked if he could have some time to remove the stomach contents, gonads and other organs. Hey. Excuse me. You mind if I get get the gonads. I'm sorry.

I'm a biology student. A graduate. By the way your statement. You should have flipped those facts. Can I get the like the sex parts. Let me ask somebody. I'm going to get the sex part. This guy wants to know if he can have the whales balls. And yet he keeps like humming. Hold on a second buddy. He keeps making like noises like grunting noises to himself. I'm a whale. I mean he definitely just said he's a whale. Look just give him the whale balls and get him out of here. Hey buddy. Here you go. Take them. All right. Get out of here now. Quote. If you have these things you can tell if it died during trauma. It's breeding habits and much more. Of course George's response was take a few measurements and then back off Sonny because

we're about to blow this thing up. Okay. Okay. And so time is really of the essence. It feels like got to get this whale. Yeah. Yeah. Bruce coincidentally also had experience with explosives but when he got a whiff of what George was like he said it became obvious explosive advice from a 24 year old would not be taken seriously. So off he went. Okay. So there's a guy blown up a whale and two guys who have expertise in explosives have come over to give the fucking idiot instructions and he had told both of them to go away. He really it's just he seems American. We're going to blow this up the American way. By the way I love Kingsford charcoal. Those percats last all day. Now get out of here. As a matter of fact that's just put

it some of them out there. We can have some whale blubber when this is all said and done. Eat like Fred Flintstone. It's going to be missed when I'm done here. Missed. The idea that you think it's going to be missed. I think it parts big enough for a crab to pick up not miss but crap crap big enough for small enough for crab hands. Yeah. And there's a pretty baby crabs on the beaches. The real little guy how big is a crab hand on average. Yeah. Like an Oregon crab hand. Oh Oregon. Well now let me kind of switch to that file talking Maine. No. OK. OK. So so off that guy goes another guy gone that could help. This is the this is a clear difference between what would happen like today and back then.

Right. Like today they'd be like no you can study the whale for as long as you need and then and then we'll find a good way to dispose of it. Yeah. Absolutely. We are still total idiots but we would absolutely like we would somebody with knowledge would be there and listen to and somewhat right. We would we would almost overdo it. Yeah. How to do it right. Yeah. Unless there was oil underneath the oil. That's different. True to his word George had everyone back up as the demolition experts from the Eugene Highway Office placed the explosives. The idea was to place the explosives so the blast would send most of the whale parts out to the ocean. Then the tide would come back in and the whale parts would come with it and highway crews would bury what the goals and others didn't

need. That is that. That is right. That's insane. It's magical. That is it is that there's a magical theory. It's a magical idea. That is a magical theory. The idea that you're like the idea that they're like well why don't we just blow it up towards the ocean. And then when the tide brings all the whale back we'll just use nets and we'll just collect it. It's pretty straightforward. I think it took an hour and 45 minutes to properly place the dynamite. So are they just like wedging it under it. That's what I can't figure out. I think they must be because like how are you picking up. You're not putting it straight underneath it. I mean it's a fucking whale. Yeah. Well and if you're moving it to get dynamite under it you can move the way. I would imagine they're digging

some sort of hole in the sand and putting it in that way. But even then you're like you're like the idea that there is yeah the idea that that's going to blow it to smithereens is just like yeah no it's not great. Because like how is the top gonna get any explosion. I think from what I know about whales have you ever seen Star Wars. Look if you want to talk about the Star Wars where they go and they because they go in that hole right and they and they blow up the Death Star. So I think what I know about whales and I studied the earth in college so I didn't study biology. But if you go into their their spout with the dynamite it'll cause an explosion all throughout the whale star. Are you thinking of the spaceship and Independence Day.

Ah fuck yeah. Yes you are. Yeah yeah yeah. Never mind. Right close though. But it seems like once you put an explosive in the spout that the rest of the whale would just combust. Yeah exactly no that is Independence Day. Yeah exactly. Okay yeah you guy fox the whale by putting it in the hole. I get I get big things confused. Sure who doesn't. You're a good guy. A sheriff's deputy moved people back to what was considered a safe distance. There were again with no knowledge of what a safe distance is for a whale explosion. There's no this man is he's not he speaks from nothing. I love that. Another 10 feet guys come on now it's a whale. It's not a barricade. Come on guys. We're not blowing up tuna. Come on guys. Get them back. Another eight. Come on. There are about

75 people there to watch. They ended up about a quarter mile away. Pretty far. That you think that's far. That's pretty I mean it's pretty far. I guess. It's not soup. I mean you definitely want to be further but you know that's that's a fair distance. Paul asked George on camera for his final observations quote well I'm confident it'll work. The only thing is we're not sure just exactly how much explosives it'll take to disintegrate. That's a huge problem thing. So the scavenger seagulls and crabs and whatnot can clean it up. This theory. Paul would later regret not pressing George on being not sure how much explosives. It's a huge component. There's really only placement and amount. Those are your two deals and he's fudging both. Yeah and the cops telling

people how far away to stand. Yeah and he thinks he's going to create whale waves and then crabs are going to carry whale like they're ants carrying sandwiches. Correct. Yeah okay. I would imagine singing. Yeah. On to the sea. On to the sea. George quote. If there's any large chunks left and we may have to do some other cleanup possibly send another charge. So he's talking about if there's a big piece left he's going to blow it up again. Yeah. Double blow up. Yep. Check out that cat. He's got sneeze. He's been sneezing. He's got the sneezes right now. Paul the dynamite was buried primarily on the leeward side of the big mammal. So as most of the remains we've blown

toward the sea leeward side of a whale. What. I don't know what that means leeward. Yeah. Yeah. Well like that's not a that's not a it's not very I don't it's probably nautical but it's not in like the rudimentary handbook. I think you know you know starboard and port side. I don't know anything about ships. Well leeward I know starboard and port side those are the two sides and neither of them are leeward. Maybe leewards. No that doesn't make sense. I feel like it doesn't make sense for a whale. So is Paul signing off on the idea that this could that it would blow it towards the sea. No. No. Paul thinks it's insane. Okay. Good. Just to be clear. Okay. Paul thinks it's like a crazy. Okay. Leeward is Dave is googling right now with the mic on

his chest and it's it's really it's it's pretty special. Okay. It's a wind thing. Is the direction downwind or downward from the point of reference the side of a ship that is towards the leeward is the lee side. If the vessel is healing under the pressure of the wind this will be lower side. Oh that doesn't really I guess there's wind but it's still that doesn't make it's a fucking whale. It's saying it's saying the side that the wind is blowing to but that's but that shouldn't be a factor with dynamite whales and dynamite dynamite seems like it's stronger than your leeward wind as far as I know you want to get that dot you want to get that whale up in the wind. Yeah. Yeah. If you just get the if you just get the little whale skyward one or two things are

going to happen either it's going to go into the ocean and then it'll conveniently wash the shore or it'll fly in the sky like kites and leave. Both are possible. Just depends on the wind. All right. So from the Eugene register it was a beautiful day to blow up a whale that is this this is a real paper. This is a paper. The sun was shining and there was a gentle breeze on the beach as state highway division workers placed twenty fifty pound cases of explosives under the forty five foot whale which washed up. Sorry. Twenty fifty pound cases of explosives. So one T. So five hundred. I don't know how much it is. Oh we don't know how much. Well I mean I don't know anything about explosion. No it's a but there's 50 pounds of explosives. There's 20.

Yeah. So it's a thousand. Oh gotcha. I see what you're saying. It's like a thousand pounds of dynamite or it's a it's a shocking amount of dynamite for a whale. I mean it's for anything. It's a forty five foot long whale. So you're talking that is so crazy feet. Yeah but still that's so much. Yeah it's dynamite. Yeah it's dynamite. So there's there's explosives every couple of feet I would imagine unless they're doing them side by side. But anyway coast residents as well as many this is what we should be doing on the fourth of July. This is the new holiday. I agree. Thank you. Coastal coast residents and people from Eugene walked over the sand dunes to the beach to see the show as workmen excavated the holes. There you go for the dynamite.

Shutterbugs took pictures of each other in front of the beached whale lying on its side displaying a gaping red and white expanse of flesh and bone where someone had sought away its lower jaw. Everybody stayed upwind. One woman onlooker suggested the highway division should wait until Monday to blow up the whale. That way she reasoned the people who came to the beach for the weekend could have an opportunity to see it. Ma'am get out of here. She's thinking outside the box. Yeah so she wants she wants the photo ops. I mean so they're digging holes right in the sand. Oh Dave they're digging holes all right. They've been digging holes since the beginning of the plan. George gave the signal and the whale explosion happened. On Paul's report

you can see what would turn out to be a huge geyser of meat. You can hear the people ooing and oing. A mom tells her kid he can take his hands out of his ears. Another woman says very calmly here comes pieces of a whale or it could be oh hell. You hear the sound of whale parts hitting the ground. Yeah right. From what I've seen and heard of beautiful Paul's report. Our cameras stopped rolling immediately after the blast. The humor of the entire situation suddenly gave way to a run for survival as huge chunks of whale blubber fell everywhere. Pieces of meat passed high over our heads while others were falling at our feet. The dunes were rapidly evacuated as spectators escaped both the falling debris and the overwhelming smell.

Take that wonder boy. It really is crazy because it's and it's huge chunks too. So however they did it and I assume you know obviously not an explosion expert but they put it on the one side to make it blow out but the explosion must have made it go made the explosion go under it a little bit more like it probably blew it down because the holes were built in that way. So it probably went some in some reason with the hole and blew it backward. So it kind of must have gone under. I think well if you really look back I think the problem is that they were putting dynamite near a whale. Right. That is a clear problem. Right. Okay so Paul and his cameraman had to shut

off the camera and run for safety. Quote at first there was nothing particularly surprising or significant about the blast. It looked like any movie explosion but as the material filled the sky and seemed to momentarily hang in the air there were a few things that gave this explosion an odd looking feel. Well number one it was a whale. Yeah right there. The first was the color. The air turned a deep crimson resembling the burst of tomato juice. If it's not tomato juice. Oh that is. It's animal. Yeah they're I mean basically calling a blood cloud. Right it's a blood cloud. Mommy look at the beautiful color of crimson. It was a beautiful crimson color. It was gosh it was the best blood cloud I ever seen. A deep burgundy wave rippled

through the sky. I ain't seen a blood cloud like that since my dad blew up. So the sound was also odd. A series of hollow thunk noises. At first I didn't know what to make of it. Then we were in a massive blubber shower and I heard Doug the cameraman say in a sing-songy voice oh no with laughter. Whoa Doug's got a good attitude. Then we were running. Yeah. By the way where's the where's the cop now who thought he knew the radius of whale explosions. I guess step back another five feet. Keep going. Because Doug said it came down as this oil rain on your jacket. It was horrible. The smell was sickening. This was all the get rid of the smell. Yeah. And here we are covered in whale juice. I mean when they when you open something

up that smell that comes. Oh yeah. The Eugene register chunks of the animal flew in every direction and spectators began to scream and run for cover when they glimpsed the large pieces soaring directly overhead. A parked car over a quarter a quarter of a mile from the blast site was the target of one large chunk about three feet long and the passenger compartment was literally smashed. Fortunately no human was hit as badly as the car however everyone on the scene was covered with small particles of dead whale. So there's there's the mist. There's video. Yeah there's the mist. Yeah there's video of this car. This car is destroyed. Looks like a Godzilla stepped on it. That's exactly what it looks like. Yeah. And the whole thing has a real like like you know

meteor headed towards the earth disaster movie vibes of like yeah except it's a whale and we did it. And we completely did it. This is actually the story of America. Of course the car belonged to Walter Umenhofer. Walter. What. Mary Walter was like I'll be the SOB way over there. He left his car in the lot. The the the demolition expert. The sad twist. And let me guess George got a Ferrari. The car had been purchased during a get a whale of a deal promotion in Eugene. David. What. How. Did. Okay. It means that he had to have told someone that after the fact was this is just something you should never admit to. I but I also think this is the greatest example that time travel exists. True. That might be that might be a good case for it.

Walter watched as a hard-headed highway worker removed the piece of blover blover with a shovel. Quote my insurance company is never going to believe this. Yeah. Yeah. Hey John listen. Hey Walter. Weird thing. Sure. A big three foot piece of a whale hit my car and it's it's a total weight cover for fire flood whale earthquake whale is a thing octopus. No whale though. So that is going to probably have to be out of pocket. How could a octopus. Go ahead. I'm not. I don't know where the question is headed because damage your car. Oh wow. If it's a land octopus who you know. Yeah. The big ones. What's the name of this insurance company. We don't know. Insurance. You know the slogan right. Yeah. I guess now I do.

Yeah. People had to go home and wash their cars. We actually had a guy who lived in a volcano and we we covered his home. I don't think that's true. Yeah. No that's just how we do it over here. People had to go home and wash their cars take baths and wash their clothes to get rid of the smell. Who's keeping the outfit. How much do you have to like your outfit. It might be your favorite pair of pants. It has to be your favorite pair of pants. I would be crying. If you get covered in a whale dynamite mist. Yeah. Say goodbye. What about just walking home naked. Take it off. I'm suggesting later. George inspected the blast area. There were still pieces of whale and a lot of blubber powder. Must have been a great walk up there when he realized everything had gone wrong

and there was still a bunch of whale on the beach that smelled bad. But right where the whale had been was a huge hole. The tail was there a few feet away. George quote. It went just exactly right. Yeah that's a planter. I mean. I love him. Except the blast funneled the hole in the sand under the whale. Except everything went right except for the part that did not go right. Except for everything we did. That was a problem because instead of the whale going out to sea was thrown toward the parking lot. George noted that his idea to move people away was a smart one. I think if we got to say that I did a really good job and that I got people away from the crazy thing. Nobody died for my stupid thing I did. See. An already waiting bulldozer came to bury the larger

chunks. A small boy ran down the beach ahead of his father and yelled look daddy a piece of whale. Okay. Sorry I have to look at this. Okay. Yeah so yeah there's just all these people milling about right doing their business boys running on the beach enjoying having a good time enjoying whale. The seagulls who were supposed to clean things up were nowhere in sight either scared away by the explosion or kept away by the smell. That didn't really matter. The remaining chunks were of such a size that no respectable seagull would attempt to tackle anyway. As darkness began to set in the highway crew were back on the beach burying the remains including a large piece of the carcass which never left the blast site. Wow. So like the crabs are totally out of

the equation at this point. Crabs are so out. But also yeah that's so true. Seagulls hearing an explosion. Right. And now the meat is too the too smelly for seagulls. Yeah they're like fuck that. I mean I'm a seagull and I'm gross because it's not what I'm doing. Yeah. Paul headed back to KATU to get this amazing story on the air. But as they were unloading all their gear they realized they left some of the film behind. It was in the trunk of the car that they had borrowed from the airport manager. No. Each guy thought that the guy was grabbing the film. Okay. Their boss was pissed. Quote gentlemen I don't care how you do this but that film will be on channel two tomorrow. They caught a break when they called and found out that the son of the car owner just happened

to be driving up to Portland the next day so he dropped it off. What might be the greatest news store news report ever aired. Walter Umenhofer called his insurance guy about the whale damaged car. Hey Walter. He laughed. Then Walter called the state highway commission and the guy there laughed. The state highway official told them to have the car fixed. But once paid for the car would belong to the state highway division. So they're like yeah get it repaired and then and then we'll give you money for it and then we'll take the car off your hands. So it's a different time. It's a different time. Yeah. Really great solution for him. And if you see the car in the video. Yeah it's a it's it's time for a different car. And the guy. So why are you selling it.

Oh whale. Oh you hit a whale. A passenger can't get into it anymore because of a whale stomach. Like a land whale. Yeah. Yeah that's not a thing. Is this some kind of scam buddy. I just want to put you in the car so I'll admit to anything. The state of the commission guy he wanted it. The car in tip top shape to sell it. And he said he didn't want it. The insurance guy. The state commission so that the state commission is agreeing. What the hell is guy. I don't mean what the hell is the highway department. They're they're going to pay for the car. And then sell it. I don't I don't know why they I don't know why they want it. So does Umenhofer get anything out of this. Yeah Umenhofer

got a check and yeah he's going to get a check from the highway department. And then as soon as he gets it like and then they get the car and then they want to sell the car like they want to be able to make as much money. They don't want to. It's all about it. Yeah. Walter went down to the repair shop and found the car covered in a tarp because it smelled so horrible. Yeah well tarp will stop that. Walter got a check for the car just 14 days after it was hit by blubber. Okay. That's impressive. Yeah that is. But again I mean this is a new department. He said he was very satisfied with the amount but said he was critical of the state highway division's method of disposing of beached whales. All right. Yeah. The man who did it George Thornton was promoted six months

later. Good. Four years later he would say your deputy shithead now sir. He's just got a picture of the the blood up whale on his desk. That's what put me over the top. Yeah. This is the career that whale built. Four years later he would say quote I've had some correspondence with a naval explosive explosive expert who said we should have used twice as much dynamite. This would have more or less vaporized the whale. More. I think that's fair. I mean the amount they used originally was insane but I think in retrospect that more dynamite would have done it. Fuck that doesn't make sense to me but I think that I think I mean maybe I just think placement. I agree but just jamming I mean that thing so it was just one they had it all set up to one detonator. So it's

yeah I mean I don't even know what they were using in the 70s. It didn't they didn't go off at once from that from what Paul said. It sounded like thunk thunk thunk thunk thunk thunk thunk. That's an issue. I think it all had to blow it once. That's that's a big issue. And I also think it had to be placed all around the whale. Yeah. Jamming at them. Jamming them in. Get in that whale hole. Yeah. Like I said it's make a hole and get in. Once you get in the once you get in the spout thing then you know the whole whale blows up. Again that's independence day. Not sure that's true but that's not the tune that George stuck to. In the mid 1990s Paul contacted George to do a follow-up but George would not go on camera. The discussion didn't go well. When Paul asked George

about telling the public about what went wrong that day George says what do you mean what went wrong. Oh wow. He's like acting like it didn't go well. Yeah. He thinks it's awesome. He he probably tells stories about how great it was. What. How. But he knows it went terribly. Not at that. I mean you know at this point it's just been seen on the news once and then it's a story. Okay. So he can tell everybody blew up a whale and got rid of a whale. Right. And then the 90s came. Uh-oh. Then Bill Clinton and Al Gore invented the intramnet. The video of Paul's report took on a life of its own. It was one of the first videos that became popular online. Now this is what they call it when it's a subscriber online bulletin board which I assume is like a this is early this is like 94 95 so

it's got to be like a forum of some kind. Some kind of weird chat room where eventually some guy asked something inappropriate to someone. That's what it was called the subscriber online bulletin board. When they wrote about the whale explosion in 1994 it was read by people all over the country. The write-up was a rewrite of a Dave Berry humor column which is a very generous description of Dave Berry. A writer for the Daily News in Idaho then reprinted the article word for word which is also known as plagiarism. Okay. Unfortunately as is often the case online the original write-up did not include the date so the Idaho writer thought it had just happened. Oh. The internet. Yummy. This is a classic thing we've learned about the internet is that this still happens

where people I've done I post a story about like holy fuck look at this. Yeah. Like that was two years ago. I know. Yeah. There is something really great when you're like you're late to the you're late to the party. Not so great. Have you seen this? You ever heard of chocolate rain? People like oh god dude please. Suddenly the Oregon Department of Transportation started getting a bunch of calls for more information about the whale explosion. Everyone was sad when they learned that it happened 25 years before. But this was just the beginning. Paul and Doug started getting calls for requests for the video. An arts festival in South Carolina wanted a copy as well as schools universities marine biology conferences and government agencies emergency management

planners for NASA bomb squads hazmat crews testing labs senators offices and all branches of the military put in requests for the video. A lieutenant from an army research center wrote quote I believe there is a use for this story in the interest of the U. S. Army since the nature of our business deals and explosives we feel that having the opportunity to view your video could be used as a learning tool for what not to do in a similar situation. Oh okay all right George now what's up. A Michigan police emergency planner wrote although it does not depict an emergency it certainly points out the need to properly plan activities ahead of time the humorous aspects of the story will be a nice departure from traditional examples of emergency

planning available in the classroom. Doug started only answering people who admitted that they just wanted the video because they thought it was funny. Okay I get that that is a little bit like if you know someone wants change on the street and they're just like I want this money for liquor you're like here's two dollars and get liquor. On June 25th 1979 41 sperm whales beached themselves in the same town this time they were buried. In 2001 a great sorry a whale carcass was beached in shallow shallow water off the coast near Adelaide. Great white sharks then began to feed off the corpse and then a video popped up of tourists going out in boats and petting the great white sharks on the head. Wait so what so just the whale was in the water and

then it's beached itself in a shallow part of the water. So then sharks were eating it and then people went out there and just pet the sharks. Great white sharks because they're Australian right or they could be American. Uh well yep they're tourists. Oh good they had to be about they had an American right. My god get one of me with that. Hold on now Karen. Uh and do one with your heads in its mouth like the lion tamer. There you go sweetie. Say Jabberwocky. In one video a woman can be heard saying quote Harry are you an idiot or what. Well honey well I'm petting a great white shark. I'm not honey I'm not an idiot at all I'm just petting this water dog. I put my cowboy hat on him. One guy climbed onto the back of the dead whale to get a souvenir photo of himself being an

idiot. Uh well as long as that was the angle. South Australian state environment minister Ian Evans said he was shocked at the tourist disregard for their own safety. Quote these creatures are not toys it is clear the state government will need to look at changing the law in order to protect people too stupid to protect themselves. The worst is that Johnny Depp took his two dogs out there too yeah. People in Australia were already banned from going with 100 meters of a live whale but now authorities would look at extending that ban to dead whales. Whales in general now. Yes but in this case the state police placed three small explosive charges in the whale's belly it was then towed away from shipping lanes and detonated. Okay. Okay. Sure. Yeah that seems

to be like a reasonable idea is to is to tow it out and blow it. Absolutely the tow and blow I'm all for it. So that wasn't the last exploding whale in January 2004 a sperm whale died on a beach in Taiwan and it was decided by a professor the remains should be moved to his lab for study but when the professor brought the whale to the institution they refused to allow it to be brought inside. So he then got permission to take it to a preserve and study it and to do that they had to drive it through the Taiwanese town of Tianan. Now decobosing organs cause methane to build up and the whale exploded on the street. Whoa like a giant death fart blew up on the street blood and guts were everywhere cars and pedestrians were covered in body parts soaked in whale blood.

Oh god that's just disgusting. When the whale blew up in Taiwan the BBC called Paul as if he were some kind of exploding whale expert. Uh-huh sure you're the guy we go to. He told the BBC he didn't blow up whales that he just covered it once and he's not an expert they said that doesn't matter and interviewed him. Yeah well you know when you say that it doesn't matter. Paul gave an interview about the whale's explosion to MPR 35 years later in 2005. He is still a reporter in Portland and people on the street still ask him have you blown up any whales this morning Paul. It has followed him his entire career when the free willy whale came to live on the Oregon coast I don't even I didn't bother to investigate that but apparently

the free willy whale went. Well he's summered there. Yeah I mean I actually know a ton about the free willy whale but I mean I mean you want to talk about the whale who blew up the most that whale was so hot for three movies you know but he would summer in Oregon uh and he was originally he spent a lot of uh you know I mean a big coastal whale always on the coasts. Did he fly? He did he did not fly. So he would swim from the Oregon coast. He'd be swam by assistant whales. Yeah assistant whales would swim him. That makes sense. Yeah so he went up there to cover the free willy arrival and some old women saw him and became upset and they came over to him and said you're the person who blows them up what are you doing here. Oh my god so he has just become

um he's now thought of as the person who did it. I don't know. Because we just are that lazy. People are terrible. But that's just lazy like it's like your name's familiar with this story. People are fucking nuts. I can't believe fake news just started. So in 2016 a 70,000 pound dead whale washed up on the beach in San Clemente California. You know people got weird of course people had all kinds of ideas. One woman sent the stern drove 75 miles to lay an orchid by the whale and then rabbits rotting flesh with homeopathic bombs. Well you know uh orcas love orchids. That's a charity I started orchids for orcas. You could start to feel the positive energy as you walk down the beach. Even though it's a carcass it's profoundly positive and anyone who

went there is blessed. So you know there was someone there who's like what are you marinating it in? It's amazing that even in this story I'm not liking people. Yeah. Even in the whale blowing up story. Yeah. I'm starting to get mad at people. Yeah everyone's reacting wrong. Somehow nobody's been right. Can you not rub homeopathic shit on the whale? Well this is beautiful. It's positive. So the man in charge of disposing of the whale corpse was named uh Piersol because uh of the beach it was located on he couldn't push it back out with the water or bury it on the beach. So it's kind of in the same position. Okay. So the county paid for uh I guess uh a contracted whale disposal company come in who cut it into quote appropriate efficient pieces

and then had uh them all taken to a landfill. Well it's not very exciting way. It's not exciting way but that makes sense right? Well I guess I just I never really uh knew it was an option to just cut it. Yeah. Yeah. Just cut it up. Well in retrospect. I want to know more about the company that did it because that to me is fucking fascinating. Yeah well our phone rings once every eight years but when it does we're the name in whale removal. Just once every eight years and then that one time he's in the bathroom. No. God damn it. No. Hello hello hello hello hello. Yeah. Every time we're about to shut the doors we get another big call. Quote it does sound gross if you think of all the whale blubber and now that it's deceased I don't know what kind of fluid it's got is does not sound like

it would be a pretty experience to cut it open but yeah yeah uh Purcell also said uh he was sent the YouTube video of the whale explosion three times. Well yeah I mean again as we know the military use that video as what not to do so it's important to see it. Well that's uh that's one from your part your area of expertise. Yeah no I've uh I remember the first time I saw whale explosion uh and you it does stays with you. I show it to my son. Yeah yeah it's it's just good clean fun. And that and the one of uh I think it's fuck I want to say it's uh it's like sweet or something but a whale is washed up. No no those were fish Swedish fish. Oh never mind. A big one. The little red guys. Yeah yeah what that's one huge one yeah. And the guy just eats them. Yeah.

No but a whale is washed up and they decide the government of the country decides that they want to use the bones you know for putting a museum. Sure. So a guy goes over took and he starts cutting along the belly. Uh huh. And he cuts like five feet and then just fucking explodes. It explodes. Oh my god I mean he keeps out of the way but it like shoots out like it's like methane. It's methane. Wow. Yeah. That is uh well. I would have thought it's something to do with this. I wonder if they ignited the methane that was in the whale. Also. Yeah the explosion. Potentially yeah but you would think that that would help their case. Fuck I don't know. Yeah it was just a bad idea. Yeah it just seems it seems a little solutionless. Very solutionless. Unless you

go the logical way of just having people cut it up and remove it. But that's not fun. No. That's not much of a celebration. That's a little clinical. Plus that lady follows the truck. Oh she's just trying to get it to the landfill and rub it more. Oh see it's the beautiful even though it's a 19 man that's the truck. Oh it's such a pretty whale. Okay. Oh look I rub it it gets shiny. Okay well the car looks good. I know. All right. Um well that is uh normal. Just a normal another another normal. I love it. It is always great how uh you know it's just uh it's a little thing. It's just that we're just going to explode a whale and this is going to be a blip on the radar of history. I love that we you know that's a story we both a lot of people know a lot a lot

a lot of people know this story um and yet there's the fucking thing about two dynamite experts. We're like hey dude don't don't do that. Like there's always a fucking level to it. It's like what are you doing? Yeah. It doesn't matter what we do. No someone always knows the right answer but we're like come on. Come on. This guy's here now. Let's use him. Uh we sign whales. We sign whales. Six.