A Galway angling enthusiast received the shock of his life on Thursday night when he reeled in a 20 ft whale at the promenade in Salthill.
Mr Malachy Linnane (32) could scarcely believe his eyes when he reeled in his catch', only to discover that he had hooked a dead whale which had been drifting in Galway Bay.
"I was fishing for dogfish off the prom at the back of Seapoint and the whale snagged my line," he said. "I hooked him and it took me about half an hour to reel him in.
"Then I cut my line and the tide took him down towards Grattan Road beach. I followed him down and with some help from passersby we pulled him ashore and turned him over.
"He was dead, which was lucky for me because if he wasn't, there would have been two skid marks on the beach and I would have been gone! I figured out early on what it was, but I still couldn't believe my eyes when I saw it on the beach."
Mr Linnane, who is a deputy head chef in the Corrib Great Southern Hotel in Galway, said that he was told by marine experts that it was a "collegian whale", which does not eat fish but feeds off plankton and has a feeder filter instead of teeth.
It is not known what caused the death of the whale, which was left on Grattan Beach overnight, attracting considerable interest from onlookers.
The mammal was carried by the tide back to sea yesterday before again being retrieved and removed from the water's edge, this time by corporation employees using a forklift.