On Tuesday, a rare beaked whale washed up in Australia. The whale, which was three to four metre long, was found dead at Redhead Beach, around 150 kilometres north of Sydney.

Experts do not know much about the whale as it spends most of its time diving deep in water. It is a good opportunity for experts to widen up their knowledge base about the whale. They are assessing the whale and even taking specimens before sending its head to the Australian Museum in Sydney.

Ronny Ling, President of Organisation for the Rescue and Research of Cetaceans in Australia, said the incident is sad, but is exciting from research point of view. There is so much that they can learn from the animal.

"We don't know much about them, we rarely get to see them. We have taken samples and measurements and will remove the head and send it to the Australian Museum", said Ling.

Its jaws will be X-rayed with the DNA, which will surely reveal about the species of beaked whale. As per the whaleresearch.org website, not much is known about the beaked whale family, which is one of the deepest diving of all cetaceans. One of the main reasons is they prefer deepwater habitats.

Ling said the little information they have about beaked whales is mainly because of stranded animals. Such creatures are not see seen regularly at sea due to their long dive times and low surfacing behaviour.

A study published in the journal PLOS ONE revealed that a tagged Cuvier's beaked whale dived to 2,992 metres and another remained underwater for 137.5 minutes. In past 25 years, Ling said he has come across few beaked whales.

Marine biologist Elise Bailey said it would be too early to say what caused the whale's death. It could be sick, old or had suffered trauma.