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The blue whale is the largest creature in the history of Earth.

Imagine an animal as long as three school buses lined up one behind the other. It's a blue whale—30 meters long and weighing up to 180 tons. It's bigger than any dinosaur that ever lived on Earth! The largest dinosaur was half that size.

And now about the heart. It weighs about 600 kilograms - like a small car. It beats slowly: only 8-10 times a minute when the whale is on the surface (you have about 80 now). And when it dives deep - only 2 beats per minute! A 5-year-old child could crawl through the main artery of the whale, which is called the aorta, as if it were a tunnel.

The tongue of a blue whale weighs as much as an elephant — 2.7 tons. But its throat is only the size of a fist! That's why the whale eats only tiny crustaceans, 4 tons a day. It takes in as much water as a school bus, then pushes it out with its tongue through special "combs" — and swallows only the crustaceans.

A baby whale is born 7 meters long and 3 tons! It drinks its mother's milk - 200 liters a day - and gains 90 kilograms in a day. It's like being born a schoolboy every morning.

Humans nearly wiped out blue whales in the 20th century. Now they are protected. Today, there are about 15,000 of these giants left in the ocean — and each whale's song can be heard 1,500 kilometers away.