Rare Blue Whales Spotted Off The Coast Of New England

Off the coast of New England is a rare but delightful sighting of not one, but two of the largest mammals on the planet. These animals? The elusive blue whales.

Rare blue whales spotted off New England coast in 'unheard of' event https://t.co/rZ3eVGXDfk

— Pamela Valemont (@poet47) August 29, 2016

Time reported that a pair of blue whales were seen off Rye Harbor by the Blue Ocean Society for Marine Conservation co-founder Dianna Schulte, while she was working aboard the Granite State. Jen Kennedy, the group's executive director, said that seeing two blue whales together is extremely rare. The animals, considered to be the largest mammals to ever exist, can grow up to 100 feet long.

In fact, these animals are so massive, that their tongues alone can weigh as much as an elephant, and their hearts, as heavy as an automobile. What is especially mind-boggling about these animals, as pointed out by the National Geographic, is that they reach such dimensions despite being on a diet composed nearly exclusively of krill - tiny shrimplike animals usually fished commercially in southern oceans. However, their size can be explained by the amount they eat - there are certain times in the year when a single adult blue whale can consume about 4 tons of krill a day.

Kennedy shared with WMUR-TV, "to spot two blue whales together is simply unheard of. In the Atlantic, they are usually sighted off of St. Lawrence in Canada." She also said that blue whale sightings usually only occur around five to ten years, adding that even their team has "never seen two together in our last 20 years of whale watching and research off the N.H. coast."

Schulte told The Guardian that she planned on sending photos of the whales to researchers in Canada so that they can learn more about the two that were spotted.