Thar she blows! Shocked fishermen discover dead whale carcass set to EXPLODE after inflating to gigantic size due to trapped gases

Shocked fishermen couldn’t believe their eyes when they discovered a floating whale carcass ready to explode after it inflated due to trapped gases.

The Norwegian crew first saw a huge black sphere floating on the water about half a mile away and were puzzled as to what it was.

They tentatively approached to get a closer look before realizing that it posed a danger and threatened to explode with significant force.

Veteran fisherman Dag Rydland said he kept his boat at a safe distance and did not dare approach closer than 100 meters for fear the mammal would explode.

“I hope it doesn’t reach the shore before then,” he told Dagbladet newspaper, adding: “If it explodes, the smelly parts will fly many meters.”

The sailor, who has been a fisherman for 27 years, said that while he had seen many dead whales in his time, this was the largest he had ever come across.

‘It stood out about three meters from the sea. The balloon was that big! I have been a fisherman for 27 years and I have seen some dead whales. But I’ve never experienced this size before.”

Images of the whale show it upside down with its taut belly sticking out of the water, which fishermen compared to a giant balloon.

The dead humpback was caught on camera bobbing in the open sea north of the Norwegian island of Andoya, deep in the Arctic Circle.

Whale researcher Tiu Similä also visited the site and told NRK that she and her team drove their boat.around it, but not close”, as it looked like it was going to “explode”.

Bloated whale carcasses often explode when trapped gases cannot gradually leak out.

When an animal dies, bacteria inside the carcass produce methane as part of the decomposition process, which can build up and harm the animal if not released.

Whales are the most extreme example of this because their enormous size makes the consequences of a gas accumulation much greater.

In 2013, a biologist was filmed cutting open a stranded whale in the Faroe Islands.

As soon as the biologist started working, the gas trapped inside exploded, throwing tons of organs and guts into the air.

Whales have also been seen exploding in the sea, and boaters off the coast of California captured the gruesome scene of a dead whale floating in the ocean.

In the dramatic images, the mammal lets out “one last burp” before exploding, releasing blood and rotting guts.

A whale explosion was prevented in Cornwall last year when a necropsy was carried out on a stranded fin whale to prevent it from exploding violently.