Over 60 Orcas Attacked An Endangered Whale Off The Coast Of Australia
In a marine park called Bremer Canyon, off the coast of Bremer Bay in western Australia, a large group of more than 60 orcas brutally attacked and killed a 59-foot-long pygmy blue whale. The incident was witnessed by a nearby whale-watching tour. It took place on Monday, April 7.
According to video footage captured by the tour company Naturaliste Charters, the orcas (Orcinas orcas) were hunting together and circling the pygmy blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus brevicauda).
Eventually, the whale’s body was seen floating to the water’s surface. Blood poured from its mouth as the orcas feasted on their meal.
“We witnessed an incredible and rare event yesterday as multiple pods of orcas successfully hunted a blue whale in Bremer Canyon,” said representatives for Naturaliste Charters.
“The intense ordeal lasted less than 40 minutes from when we first saw the blue at the surface to when the battle was over.”
When the blue whale was officially dead, the orcas celebrated their victory with “breaches and tail slaps.” Such an incident has only been observed a handful of times.
Orcas are highly intelligent creatures and hunt in organized groups. They use teamwork and complex communication to take down prey much bigger than themselves.
Their tactics are often quite brutal, as they have previously been seen creating large waves to wash seals off floating ice, separating whale calves from their mothers and drowning them, and tearing out the livers of sharks.
The pygmy blue whale was just the orcas’ latest victim. It was covered in bite marks, and at one point, it was overtaken by as many as 30 orcas at once.
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“We estimated about 60 orcas involved, likely more than that,” said Jennah Tucker, a marine biologist who works for Naturaliste Charters.
“We’ve confirmed five different family groups were involved. Quite often, many will move in once it’s over. But in this case, we saw 20 to 30 animals at a time crowding around the whale to take it down.”
There were also several juvenile orcas in the group, including one as young as a month old, showing that they are involved in feeding events like these from a young age.
Pygmy blue whales are a subspecies of blue whale, which is the largest animal on Earth. Regular blue whales can grow up to 110 feet long, while pygmy blue whales reach up to about 79 feet long. Pygmy blue whales may be smaller than blue whales, but they are still larger than many other types of whales.
They are primarily found in the Indian Ocean and the southwestern Pacific Ocean. They are listed as endangered under the Australian Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act and Data Deficient by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
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