Famous Exploding Whale News Clip Remastered in 4K

On November 12th, 1970, Paul Linnman recorded a legendary news report on a whale corpse that had cleaned up on the shores of Florence, Oregon.

Authorities thought using explosives was the most reliable way to dispose of the dead sperm whale. Things immediately went wrong and the notorious news report is often mentioned as one of the Internet’s earliest viral news clips.

On its 50th anniversary, the Oregon Historical Society had the original 16mm footage that Doug Brazil recorded that day with Paul Linnman remastered to a 4K resolution.

“Linnman and Brazil captured the original unedited footage on 16mm color reversal motion picture film. They recorded the audio track live, on location, on a magnetic stripe directly on the film using an attached microphone,” Matthew Cowan, the OHS archivist for photography and moving images said. “As opposed to the degradation that happens with video tape from making a copy of a copy of a copy, the original 16mm film — what was shot that day on the beach — still projects a crisp image with bright vibrant colors.” [source].