Boaters witness ‘one-of-a-kind’ moment when predators attack whale mom and baby in CA
Since early December, an uncommon pod of killer whales has been spotted hunting prey up and down the southern California coast.
Boaters and experts have reported seeing the pod hunting dolphins, but a group of tourists got a front row seat to a particularly exciting attack on Jan. 2 when the pod attacked a gray whale mom and her calf, according to Tyler Askari, who is assistant port captain and spokesperson for Harbor Breeze Cruises.
After searching all morning for the creatures, the tour group received “exciting” reports that “the pod of orcas had something with them and they looked like they were doing some hunting” near the Palos Verdes coastline, Askari told McClatchy News in an interview.
The pod was attacking a gray whale cow-calf pair.
By the time the two Harbor Breeze Cruise tours arrived to the site, the baby whale had been attacked, and it never resurfaced, Askari said. But “the fight was still going on” as one of the orcas targeted the mama whale.
“There was visible scarring and bleeding occurring from the tail of the gray whale,” according to Askari. “The gray whale was running away, and it was like swinging its tail towards the orca, but the orca was persistent.”
After about four minutes, the orca began to give up as the gray whale began to tire.
“The whale did appear to get a little sluggish. However, I think what happened is that the orca realized that it was too big of a fight,” Askari said. “They had already gotten that juvenile down, so they did give up, and then the adult gray whale ended up surviving and continued south by itself.”
Videos show the orcas and gray whale swimming near the two tour boats.
Askari said that while it’s not uncommon for orcas to hunt gray whales, seeing killer whales at all is a rarity.
“It’s never really happened to Southern California where we’ve seen, you know, a gray whale attack. It’s common for orcas, like I mentioned earlier, but it’s something that typically happens further up north,” Askari said. “Even then...witnessing that attack is something that’s really unheard of. It’s something that you wouldn’t really see.”
Palos Verdes is about 30 miles southwest of downtown Los Angeles.
This story was originally published January 5, 2024 at 8:31 AM with the headline "Boaters witness ‘one-of-a-kind’ moment when predators attack whale mom and baby in CA."
