In One Ear: Hooligans
Those naughty orcas off Southwest Europe have struck again, Euronews Green reports. On May 12, they repeatedly rammed a 49-foot sailing yacht in the Strait of Gibraltar until it sank. The two aboard were luckily rescued by a nearby oil tanker.
The same small pod of about 15 killer whales, designated as Gladis, is responsible. Grupo Trabajo Orca Atlántica, a research group that tracks the subspecies, says there have been hundreds of such orca/boat interactions with the pod since 2020, but only three boats have sunk.
Alfredo López Fernandez, a group representative, thinks the orcas are selecting the boats they attack. “We don’t know the origin or the motivation,” he said, “but defensive behavior based on trauma as the origin of all this gains more strength for us every day.”
He’s referring to the orca White Gladis, which he suspects was injured by a boat, and it “flipped a behavioral switch,” causing the orca to seek revenge on boats, and the pod is merely imitating his/her behavior. Andrew W. Trites, of the Marine Mammal Research Unit at the University of British Columbia, however, thinks it’s “just playful behavior that’s gotten way out of hand.”
Either way, there’s no end in sight for these attacks, which affect mariners’ safety. They’re also a conservation issue, as this subpopulation of orcas is endangered.
