By Brian Myers
| Published
Residents of Placentia Bay in Canada’s Newfoundland province have reported finding hundreds of mysterious white blobs washed up on the shores. What these objects are is not yet known, but federal authorities released a statement that they were not related to any biofuel discharge or any form of hydrocarbon. Testing is currently underway, but the results could take months.
Unidentified Blobs
The white blobs were first brought to the public’s attention in early September when members of a Facebook group named “Beachcombers of Newfoundland and Labrador” began posting photos of these strange objects online. The first one shared by a member was captioned with details that described the blobs as being in size ranging from “a dinner plate right down to a toonie (a Canadian coin)” and similar in appearance to a form of Canadian dough called touton.
The waxy surface of these white blobs led some to the false conclusion that whales were to blame, with good reason. In the early 2000s, a large waxy blob washed ashore in the Great White North and was later identified as a severely decomposed whale. These giant mammals can resemble large wax chunks when they are rotting, but marine biologists have ruled out this explanation.
Scientists Have Ruled Out What It Isn’t
Scientists have also eliminated ambergris, lubricant deposits, and paraffin wax from crude oil as the source of the white blobs. But local residents are anxious for answers amid the number of elder community members who have lived in the area for decades and maintain that these objects are a new phenomenon.
The lack of answers from federal officials hasn’t stopped others from speculating about the source of these white blobs. Steven Carr, who serves as a biology professor at Memorial University, told the media that he believes the source is a common item found in most grocery stores; Bisquick.
A Mundane Possibility
Carr related a story of getting a phone call from a volunteer who was cleaning up a beach on the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia. The unnamed source sent Carr a photo of a partially empty bag of Bisquick that had washed up on the beach rocks. The powder was intact and dry, which helped him formulate a theory.
Carr believes that a container carrying Bisquick fell from a transport ship and has been slowly washing up on the shoreline in the form of white blobs. He is currently busying himself with an experiment to test his hypothesis where he has several bags of the biscuit-dough powder weighted down under the cold waters of the bay. He told The Weather Network that he plans on checking them every few days to see if his experiment has yielded any white blobs.
For now, residents along the shoreline will have to wait until further testing on the white blobs has concluded. But if Carr’s unofficial biology experiment yields a similar object, then we might be closer to understanding the truth than we realize. Until then, more and more of these mystery shapes keep dotting the beaches.
Sources: New York Times
