A HUMPBACK whale has been sighted in the Irish Sea – only the second such sighting recorded off the east coast in almost 20 years.

The mammal, with its distinctive tail fluke, was spotted almost a year to the day since a young dinghy sailor on a training course encountered a humpback off Howth Head.

This new sighting, recorded late last week and confirmed this week by the Irish Whale and Dolphin Group, was observed by sea kayaker Julia Baer midway between Rockabill and Lambay.

Group member Matt Comiskey, William Ormsby and friends then spotted it an hour later while sailing on a yacht, Pomma Lady, a mile east of Lambay island.

The whale spent a good 30 minutes “blowing”, within 30 metres of the yacht. It appeared to be travelling south, and the group’s sightings co-ordinator Pádraig Whooley says there is a “very good chance” it could be seen off the east coast in coming days, weather permitting.

“It may be a coincidence, but it may be the same humpback from July 2010,” Mr Whooley told The Irish Times.

“Unfortunately, we have no strong images from last year’s encounter with the dinghy sailor, which was recorded by Seán Pierce of Shearwater Sea Kayaking,” he added.

“However, the mammals are creatures of habit and they are known to return, like Boomerang, a frequent visitor to the west Cork coast from 2001,” he said. “We’ve also had re-sightings of two humpbacks off the Kerry coastline in the last few days.

“But this one is very exciting for people on the east coast, as humpbacks are still rare enough and tend to be seen on the Atlantic coastline . . . Unfortunately, humpbacks were clobbered by whalers, almost to extinction, because they like inshore waters and tend to surface for long periods.”

Humpback whales inhabit all oceans, with an estimated 10,000 surviving in the north Atlantic. They were exploited commercially from the 1800s until 1966.

The group has been researching their extensive migrations, as they are believed to winter in the Atlantic off the West Indies as far south as Venezuela, and in the eastern Atlantic around the Cape Verde islands and off northwest Africa.

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