‘Silent’ Copter Dragging Cow Carcass Suggested as Lure : 10,000 Call About Wandering Whale

More than 10,000 people have called authorities about the plight of a 40-ton wandering humpback whale that remained lost in a shallow slough off the Sacramento River today, with half offering suggestions about how to get him out.

“It’s still in there, just swimming around. We sent a boat up there this morning to make sure no other boats were in the slough and that the whale was OK,” said Petty Officer Jose Hernandez at the Rio Vista Coast Guard station.

The whale, which wandered into the Sacramento River Delta eight days ago after making a wrong turn into San Francisco Bay, has been nicknamed E.T. by authorities, after the movie space creature who was trying to find his way home. He was spotted shortly before sunset Saturday in the narrow Shag Slough, which Hernandez said is at most 18 feet deep in spots.

It had been spending its time about 12 miles downstream from the slough, swimming back and forth in the river near Rio Vista, a small town about 30 miles south of Sacramento.

One caller proposed dropping a female whale into the delta to draw E.T. out, said Jan Roletto, a biologist with the Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito.

“Where are we supposed to get this female whale?” Roletto asked. “We’d probably end up with two problems on our hands instead of one.”

‘Silent’ Helicopter

“The most bizarre idea was to get a helicopter that doesn’t make any noise, attach it to half a cow, trail the carcass in the water and the whale will follow it out,” Roletto said.

The 40-foot-long whale managed to turn around in the slough, which is only about as wide as the whale is long. It swam downstream but refused to go under a small bridge that it swam under earlier.

The bridge pilings are 10 feet apart, giving the whale just enough space to squeeze through, said Bob Jones, a special agent with the National Marine Fisheries Service.

“He got up there. He should be able to get out, but he just doesn’t want to,” said Robert Taylor, a machinery technician first class at the Rio Vista Coast Guard station.