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Modeling Large Whale Entanglement Injuries: An Experimental Analysis Of The Influence Of Tissue Compliance, Line Tension, And Draw-Length On Epidermal Abrasion Resistance, Jeremy Paul Winn
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Two test systems were developed to evaluate the influence of draw-length and tissue compliance on entanglement-induced epidermal abrasion in humpback (Megaptera novaeangliae) and right whale (Eubalaena glacialis) tissue samples. Under straight pull abrasion tests an adult right whale fluke required 3.7 times the load and 15 times the draw-length of a right whale calf flipper to induce epidermal failure while a humpback fluke was intermediate between these extremes. Epidermal thickness did not appear to be the cause of this difference in abrasion resistance. Epidermal thickness averaged 8.0k0.2 mm for the calf flipper, 4.9k0.4 rnrn for the humpback fluke, and 5.1k0.1 …