(KRILL HEAVE HUGE SIGH OF RELIEF)

BY JACK KOOSTOW, MARINE REPORTER

“JUST MAKE IT CLEAN.” That was the last request of a whale who has apparently made an informed choice to sacrifice himself for the greater good of the planet.

According to Dr Oliver Meanspout, a biologist who has spent his life deciphering whale song, the whales of the world actually had a conference in Antarctica last summer to discuss global warming (They’re even more intelligent than we believed, he insists).

“Maybe more whales in one place than ever before,” he says. “Indeed, it registered as a seismic event. Even knocked a large piece of ice off the shelf. Given the crisis around the globe, the great giants, whose bodies can store tonnes of carbon, and whose oil can be a useful substitute for dirty fossil fuels, came to the conclusion that it was not a time for selfishness. If it requires their extinction to save the world, then it’s a price worth paying. Thar she blows,as they say.”

Dr Meanspout, who also claims to be able to converse with dolphins and squid, says that another reason for the decision is the enormous increase in climate change protests. “The noise is beginning to interfere with the whales’ ability to navigate. It might actually explain the increase in mass beachings. Although that might just be Enya songs.”

Animal activists are not expected to take the whale news well. Only the Save the Krill Foundation has expressed a positive opinion so far. Indeed, Dr Meanspout, who doesn’t speak Krill but has had dolphins translate their language for him, he says, argues that the relentless and brutal hunting and slaughter of most of the world’s whales will give the small shrimp-like plankton creatures a chance to live again in decent quantities, which in itself might be of assistance to the Earth. “It could be a win-win situation,” he says. “Well, for us and the plankton anyway.”