Wild orcas living in the Strait of Gibraltar have attacked and sunk a passenger boat this past week – for the third time since 2020. Image credit: Jonas Bratland via Pexels.
Wild orcas living in the Strait of Gibraltar have attacked and sunk a yacht this past week – the third account of them sinking a vessel since 2020.
Killer whales aren’t generally considered to be dangerous to humans, despite their threatening moniker.
There is no recorded account of a fatal attack on a human by a wild killer whale.
However, the whales are becoming increasingly hazardous to anyone deciding to go boating in the region off the Iberian coast, between Spain and Portugal.
Since 2020, there have been approximately 500 incidents of orcas in the region attacking boats with uncanny precision.
A study published in the journal Marine Mammal Science in June of 2022 said that the orca attacks all “follow a clear pattern, with orcas approaching from the stern to strike the rudder, then losing interest once they have successfully stopped the boat.”
The prevailing theory is that a single orca learned this approach to disable the boats, and others have been learning the behaviour.
Killer whales are known for their advanced intelligence and social dynamics, with whales in different geographic regions displaying different learned behaviours which some scientists are considering to be akin to unique cultures.
Some biologists believe the first orca to display this behaviour may have been hurt or wounded by a passing boat and began attacking the boats as a trauma response, or, as some have described it, as “an act of revenge.”
Alfredo López Fernandez, a biologist at the University of Aveiro in Portugal, said that the motivation of the animals was still unclear.
“The orcas are doing this on purpose. Of course, we don’t know the origin or the motivation, but defensive behaviour based on trauma, as the origin of all this, gains more strength for us every day,” said Fernandez.
Macquarie University marine scientist, Dr Vanessa Pirotta, posed the idea that the whales could simply find disabling the boats to be interesting or entertaining, citing other “cultural fads” adopted by killer whales in the past.
“I say that because it might be the case that these killer whales are doing it because it’s interesting now and then they get over it, we have seen killer whales in the early 1990’s, kill salmon and then wear it on their heads like a salmon hat, and then they soon got over doing that,” said Dr Pirotta.
Whether the attacks are motivated by vengeance or novelty, it’s probably a good idea to exercise caution when sailing the Iberian Coast.
