Beached Whale at Breezy Point

Updated, 3:22 p.m. | An emaciated fin whale about 60 feet long and weighing perhaps 60 or 80 tons beached itself at Breezy Point, Queens, on Wednesday morning, and appeared near death, said experts who were preparing to try to euthanize it.

The whale was spotted on the shore of Rockaway Inlet around 10:40 a.m. nearBeach 216th Street and Palmer Place, the police said, blocks from the parts of the neighborhood that were devastated by Hurricane Sandy.

As emergency-service responders from the police and fire departments sprayed water on the animal as the tide receded, trying to keep it hydrated, the animal “was moving some of its flippers and its fluke and opening its mouth,” said Mendy Garron, a biologist with the National Marine Fisheries Service who coordinates marine-mammal rescues.