Last week, the Seymour Marine Discovery Center announced it plans to disassemble the blue whale skeleton exhibit, affectionately called “Ms. Blue,” that has graced the outside of the building for nearly 40 years because the structure supporting the whale’s bones has become unsafe.

The skeleton has been displayed outdoors on UC Santa Cruz’s Coastal Science Campus since 1985. Both the bones and the steel structures holding them together have degraded from years of intense coastal winds and salty ocean air.

More than a million people have visited the 87-foot-long blue whale over the years, said Jonathan Hicken, executive director at the Seymour Center. The center is exploring ideas to help Ms. Blue’s legacy live on, including 3D-printing replicas of the bones and mounting them on a new structure, creating a virtual animation experience, installing an artistic rendition of the whale, or letting the bones lie where the steel structure once hoisted them up.

The Seymour Center is not publicizing the day when Ms. Blue will come down to avoid drawing crowds and creating a safety hazard. However, the center will be holding a celebration of Ms. Blue’s life on Sunday from 10 a.m. to noon.

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