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A 5-foot long sea turtle that washed ashore was finally given an unmarked grave on the Second Avenue beach Monday.

Don McLain, equipment operator for the city’s Department of Public Works [DPW], said the dead animal was lodged in between the rocks that form the jetty separating the First and Second avenue beaches in the weeks prior. The equipment the DPW would have had to use to dislodge the creature was in need of repair, so the department had to wait until the tide could assist them.

In the days after it washed ashore, someone removed the animal’s head, he said. McLain suspects the animal met its fate when it encountered a boat propeller due to a large slice he saw down the side of the turtle’s abdomen.

Mike Kapp, a technician with the Marine Mammal Stranding Center, confirmed it was a leatherback sea turtle. They are some of the largest sea turtles on earth; their evolutionary roots trace back over 100 million years.

It’s the fourth large sea turtle McLain has seen wash ashore within the last 20 years, he said. The city resident has been working for the DPW for the past 21 years. Dead sea turtles are not the strangest thing he has seen wash ashore in Asbury.

“I’ve seen goats, heads of cattle, dolphins,” he said.

Although many dolphins have washed up along the coast this year, none of them washed ashore on any of Asbury Park ‘s beaches, said McClain.

[Photo at top: DPW workers get ready to scoop up the five foot leatherback turtle to bury it in a hole dug nearby.]

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