A 45-foot-long dead whale washed ashore on San Francisco's Ocean Beach Sunday, and its massive carcass remains spread across a stretch of sand that's highly trafficked by walkers, joggers and surfers.| RELATED | Dead whale washes ashore at Asilomar State BeachOfficials are asking the public to keep their distance and observe the whale from afar.Gray whales usually pass through the Bay Area during their northern migration to Arctic waters in late March through April and it's not unusual for a few of them to die and be found on beaches in spring. But this body appeared in the region later than usual and it's adding to an astonishing number of dead gray whales in less than three months. The number of dead gray whales observed has been increasing since 2019 and there have been 14 of them since April 2021 alone, according to the Marine Mammal Center. One pygmy sperm and two fin whale carcasses have also been found since the start of 2021."In 2019, when this unusual mortality event began, we had 13 dead gray whales," said Giancarlo Rulli, a spokesperson for the center. "Last year we had five. In an average year, we and our partners at the California Academy of Sciences respond to about five to 10 dead whales of all species in a given year." Malnutrition, entanglement and trauma from ship strikes are the most common causes of death in the whales identified by the center’s researchers in recent years.Scientists from the center and the California Academy of Sciences performed a necropsy on the whale found Sunday, and the specimen was identified a female with average fat stores. They were unable to determine a cause of death, but they made several other observations that may provide clues to why the animal didn't survive. This whale was in fresh condition based on the quality of its skin, internal tissues and organs. While scientists found fractured spinal vertebrae, a "lack of bruising and hemorrhaging to nearby tissue indicates the animal was most likely hit by a ship after it had already died of another cause," the center said.The research team noticed the whale had a mostly empty stomach and it's puzzling why this adult female was migrating north to cool, food-rich Arctic waters this late this season. Gray whales with calves usually migrate later in the season, according to the center, but this mammal didn't show any signs of having recently nursed young. “We are hopeful that samples taken during the necropsy will shed some light on the reasons behind her late journey north and any potential ailments that may be affecting the gray whale population," Moe Flannery, Senior Collections Manager of Birds and Mammals for the California Academy of Sciences, said in a statement.