Members of the St. Johns Sheriff’s Office and workers from other agencies responded to St. Augustine Beach after a small whale washed up in the sand.

A Hong Kong government official has vowed to mull legal changes and set up protocols to better protect whales after the discovery of a carcass sparked anger on social media and speculation that sightseers had contributed to the animal’s death.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission performed a necropsy on a whale that washed ashore at Hanna Park in Jacksonville, but the report does not reveal to researchers how the whale died.

Captain Bud Brasier told News4JAX he spotted the humpback whale in the St. Mary’s Channel on Saturday, Jan. 7 around 11 a.m.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries Southeast reported a 47 foot male sperm whale stranded off the Florida Keys.