DUXBURY, Mass. (AP) -- New England Aquarium officials say results of a necropsy on a dead fin whale that washed up on a Massachusetts beach could take weeks, maybe months.

Aquarium spokeswoman Diana McCloy said Tuesday that samples from the 52-foot-long whale were sent to different labs. Biologists hope the testing shows how the whale died and ended up on Duxbury Beach on Monday morning.

The private group that owns the beach buried the nearly 30-ton carcass Tuesday morning in another part of the beach. Cris Luttazi of the ownership group, the Duxbury Beach Reservation, says the whale was separated into two pieces during the necropsy and an excavator dragged the pieces to the burial spot.

McCloy says it appeared the whale had been dead about two or three days before washing ashore.