Day Around the Bay: Surfboard-Stealing Otter Resurfaces in Santa Cruz

• A North Pacific right whale, considered one of the “rarest of whales,” was just spotted late last week off the shores of near Point Reyes. It’s estimated that there are fewer than 500 North Pacific right whales still alive, and this one showed up at the ​​Cordell Bank National Marine Sanctuary, so whale experts with the Applied California Current Ecosystem Studies were able to get photos. [KRON4]

• Last summer’s surfboard-stealing internet sensation Otter 841 was seen again in Santa Cruz, after several months of not having appeared. The wily female otter crashed the Santa Cruz Longboard Union 38th Annual Memorial Day Club Invitational, and as seen above, was back up to her surfboard-commandeering ways. [KSBW]
• Three blocks of 19th Avenue (between Sloat Boulevard and Taraval Street) will have two of their northbound lanes closed for repairs between 9 am-3 pm Wednesday through Friday, so expect traffic backups during daytime hours. According to the Chronicle, the closures are scheduled so crews can repair “severe” potholes on the thoroughfare. [NBC Bay Area]
• The AI company Scale AI just subleased about 180,000 square feet at 650 Townsend Street, a building once occupied by Airbnb, but you might remember it better as the former Zynga headquarters. [Chronicle]
• Pittsburg police have been served with an excessive force lawsuit, over a 2022 case where they pepper-sprayed, tear-gassed, and shot a man who was afraid to leave his hotel room because he was having a mental health crisis. [KTVU]
• A 38-year-old prisoner escaped from the San Benito County Correctional Facility in Hollister early Tuesday morning, and he remains at large. [KION]

Image: Sea Otter in the Prince William Sound, Alaska (Getty Images)