Humpback Whale rescue today

[Lawaia]

Was out looking for some bass early am and spotted a 40 ft Humpback Whale tangled in a large fish net with rope near Manasquan Inlet. We called it in on 16 to the Coast Guard, and then got in position to try and help it. We started cutting lines and net but it was really difficult just by its huge size, the amount of gear it was tangled in, and it was very stressed. At one point we thought it died. We just kept cutting rope after rope and more of the net, and it slowly began to move around and began to let out some pretty big bellows from its blowhole. After about an hour the Coast Guard and a few other boats were surrounding us as we were cutting the last line around its head area and one of the pectoral fins. Finally the lines and net were all cut and the it began to slowly start swimming away, along with taking a few big huge breaths of air. Coast Guard crew blew thier air horn a few times and gave us a cheer. Later this afternoon I got a call from a director at NOAA who was very interested in all the details as well extremely thankful. Very surreal to actually be alongside touching a creature of this size, with its huge eyes looking right at you. There is definitely a higher level of intelligence in these creatures as it almost at the end knew we were trying to help it, and sort of remained calm and still. I was definitely scared but also so excited at the same time. Awesome feeling.

(I have a lot of pics and a small short video clip but am having trouble uploading them)