The female orca was spotted tending to a baby pilot whale. Getty Images
- Killer whales near Spain and Portugal have sunk three sailing boats in recent years.
- An orca named Luna that damaged boats near Vancouver Island in the 2000s just wanted to play.
- Luna lived alone and befriended people for years before he was hit by a tow truck and killed.
A string of incidents in which orca have rammed and sunk sailboats may have been sparked by a single, traumatized female, according to a scientist – but at least one other orca has been previously documented intentionally colliding with boats, and from far less nefarious sources Found .
A population of killer whales near Portugal and the Iberian Peninsula in Spain first began having “disturbing” interactions with boats in 2020. Since then, researchers have identified hundreds of incidents of an orca approaching or colliding with a boat, although most incidents were short-lived and caused only minimal damage. Behavior generally follows the same pattern: the orca approaches the stern of the boat and bangs on the rudder until the boat is successfully brought to a stop.
In three instances, the orcas caused the sinking of sailboats, leading some to describe the interactions as “attacks.” Alfredo López Fernandez, a biologist at the University of Aveiro in Portugal who studies the orcas, told Live Science the behavior could have come from a single female named White Gladis, who was hit by a boat and has since started stalking the orcas to ram. The other orcas may simply learn the behavior from her.
Andrew Trites, director of the Marine Mammal Research Unit at the University of British Columbia in Canada, told Insider he was “overwhelmed” by the recent incidents, adding they were “unprecedented.” However, the encounters reminded him of a young male orca named Luna, who exhibited similar behavior toward boats about 20 years ago.
Luna was part of the L Group of the critically endangered Southern Resident Community. The L-Pod now consists of about 30 individual orcas that spend their summers near the San Juan Islands in Washington. They feed on fish, primarily salmon, and spend winters hunting on the Pacific coast from California to Alaska.
But in the summer of 2001, the two-year-old Luna was suddenly all alone.
“He got lost, separated from his group and was left in one of the outer coastal areas of British Columbia,” Trites said.
After Luna surfaced alone in Vancouver Island’s Nootka Sound, scientists were initially skeptical of reports that a baby orca whale was all alone. Also, given Luna’s age and the social nature of orcas, they weren’t sure if he would survive. But somehow he managed to hunt and feed himself without the support of a pod.
“Being a social animal, he felt very lonely and developed a strong bond with boats,” Trites said. “He learned to swim behind a boat, hold on to the oar and take it down to stop the boat from moving. It was an animal that was clearly looking for social interaction.”
Luna’s desire to play with boats and be around people made him famous. He would swim up to boats and rub himself against them, or he would scold people and even let them pet him. While many adored the playful killer whale who befriended humans, the situation inevitably caused problems.
News reports from the time reported how Luna’s behavior damaged several boats. In 2004, the 75-year-old fishing boat captain told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer that the orca continued to “bully and bang” after Luna damaged the boat and forced him to set up a rope and pulley system just to steer it like a beach ball around the boat for five hours.
The interactions led to efforts to remove Luna and reunite him with his group, but these were opposed by a local aboriginal community. Shortly before Luna surfaced in Nootka Sound, the chief of the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nations had died. The Mowachat/Muchalahat peoples believed that Luna embodied the spirit of their chief and did not want the orca to be moved.
Luna stayed in the sound for nearly five years, but “unfortunately for Luna, it didn’t end well,” Trites said.
The orca was killed in 2005 after being hit by a tugboat.
The killer whales that “attack” boats may just be playing
As in the case of Luna, Trites believes that whales near the Iberian Peninsula are more likely to engage in playful behavior towards boats than to attack them.
“They are very tactile. You have a sense of touch. Their skin is sensitive,” Trites said of orcas, explaining that they are known for running their teeth over another killer whale’s body, rubbing and bumping into each other, even rubbing their bodies on pebbles.
Unlike Luna, this situation is unique in that it affects a growing number of whales. Trites said orcas are extremely intelligent and can learn behaviors simply by observation. The fact that other orcas mimic and adopt this behavior suggests that it is positively reinforced, meaning they derive some benefit or enjoyment from it.
He also said that the idea of a lone killer whale being traumatized and taking “vengeance” with the help of other orcas was a little too “Hollywood-movie.”
“There’s no doubt that people on board these small boats feel attacked,” Trites said, but noted that he doesn’t think “attack” is the right term because the intent of the behavior isn’t clear yet.
Still, he said these interactions could be catastrophic for whales and humans. And as more killer whales in this population continue to engage in this behavior, it may only be a matter of time before a whale or person is seriously injured or killed.
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