orca hunting yachts

Why are orcas attacking boats and sometimes sinking them?

After four years and hundreds of incidents, researchers remain puzzled why orcas, also known as killer whales, continue to ram boats – sinking a few of them – along the Iberian Peninsula. The most-recent incident was the sinking of a yacht on Oct. 31 in the Strait of Gibraltar.

The origin of these interactions remain a "great mystery," said Alfredo López, a University of Santiago biologist, but he does not believe the behavior is aggressive. Orcas are large dolphins, López said. And like dolphins, the events could stem from the orcas’ curious and playful behavior, such as trying to race the boats.

López, who specializes in orcas, and his team, Grupo de trabajo Orca Atlántica (GOTA) , have tracked these encounters since 2020. The team’s recent study theorizes the orcas could also be exhibiting cautionary behavior because of some previous traumatic incident.

Where have killer whales interacted with boats?

GOTA has tracked more than 350 interactions just on the Iberian Peninsula since 2020. Most have taken place along the Strait of Gibraltar, but the orcas’ mischief or self-defense may be spreading north. An incident was reported in June in the  Shetland Islands in Scotland .

GOTA defines interactions as instances when orcas react to the presence of approaching boats, such as:

• Interaction without physical contact.
• Some physical contact without damage.
• Contact that causes serious damage that could prevent the navigation of the boat.

Recent incidents when orcas attacked boats and sank them

The Oct. 31 incident occurred in the Strait of Gibraltar where a pod of orcas sank a mid-size sailing yacht named the Grazie Mamma after a 45-minute interaction,  Live Science reported . 

On June 19 an orca rammed a 7-ton yacht multiple times off the Shetland Islands in Scotland, according to an account from retired Dutch physicist Dr. Wim Rutten in the Guardian.

"Killer whales are capable of traveling large distances, so it is not out of the ordinary that an animal could travel that far," said Tara Stevens, a marine scientist at CSA Ocean Sciences Inc. "To my knowledge, this data is not available, so we cannot confirm at this time if these are the same animals." 

Including the Oct. 31 incident, orcas have sunk four boats this year. The previous sinking occured in May , off the coasts of Portugal and Spain, but whale expert Anne Gordon told USA TODAY  in May that the incidents shouldn't heighten concerns about the whales.

"Yes, they're killer whales. And yes, their job is to be predators in the ocean, but in normal circumstances there is absolutely zero threat to humans in a boat," Gordon said .

Most of the interactions have involved sailboats, but fishing boats, semi-rigid boats and motorboats haven’t gone unscathed. 

Are these the same killer whales attacking boats or unrelated incidents?

López hypothesizes that the interactions could be a self-induced behavior where you're "inventing something new and repeat it. This behavior coincides with the profile of the juveniles." He said it could also be response to an aversive situation: "One or several individuals had lived a bad experience and tried to stop the boat so as not to repeat it. This behavior coincides with the profile of adults."

"Fifteen different orcas from at least three different communities" have been identified, López said. And they are probably teaching the habit to others, or the others are mimicking the behavior. "Without a doubt orcas learn by imitation," López said.  The majority of the culprits are juveniles that touch, push and sometimes turn the vessels. He noted that adult males don't appear to be involved.

"Killer whales are incredibly intelligent animals that do learn behaviors from observation of other individuals," Stevens said. "Typically, very unique behaviors such as this are learned 'within' group, meaning individuals of the group may learn from each other and participate, but that does not necessarily mean that the behavior is shared outside the group with other individuals."

Which pods of killer whales are battering the boats?

Orcas operate in a social structure called a pod. These pods generally are a group of several generations of related orcas. Hierarchies are established within them, and they communicate and learn from one another, the study reads.

GOTA researchers have identified the individuals responsible for the interactions . One large pod is made up of three generations. It starts with grandmother Gladis Lamari, her daughter, grandchildren and a few other relatives.

Another pod comprises siblings Gladis Negra and Gladis Peque. Both have been photographed interacting with boats. Their mother, Gladis Herbille, has generally just watched her children at a distance from the boats, the study said.

A third group in the study are siblings and a cousin.

Orcas often tracking bluefin tuna

The movements of orcas depend on the location of their main food source, bluefin tuna. The migratory movements of tuna are very dynamic and predicting exactly where interactions will take place is very difficult, the report said. According to NOAA , Atlantic bluefin tuna are the largest in the tuna family and can reach a length of 13 feet and up to 2,000 pounds. They are a highly migratory species and can migrate thousands of miles across an entire ocean.

About the Iberian orcas

While they are called killer whales, orcas are actually the largest member of the dolphin family. This aquatic marine mammal family includes whales, dolphins and porpoises.

The Iberian orca is a subpopulation of the Atlantic orca population. These orcas are from the Strait of Gibraltar and the Gulf of Cádiz. Iberian orcas are small: 16 to 21 feet compared with Atlantic orcas that measure almost 30 feet.

Orcas in general are fast, reaching speeds up to 27.6 mph. By comparison, a 39-foot sailboat travels at about 9.2 mph.

What should you do if your boat is attacked by killer whales

The study recommended these tips to reduce the duration and intensity of the interaction.

• Stop the boat.
• Leave the rudder loose.
• Radio for help.

According to the GOTA study, most of the vessels involved in interactions are medium-sized (less than 49 feet) sailboats, with a paddle rudder, sailing at an average of 6.9 mph, under both sail and motor.

The interactions have been mostly concentrated in the spring and summer months and have been concentrated in the midday hours. They've lasted on average for 40 minutes, but several last less than 30 minutes. 

Types of rudders Iberian orcas have approached

"It is very common for dolphins to interact with the boats and approach," López said. "Before 2020, the orcas did it with frequency but they weren't classified as attacks. Now, sometimes they touch the boat and the encounter is unfairly classified as an attack. They judge socially before understanding what (orcas) do."

Orcas Are Ramming Into Yachts In The Iberian Peninsula, And Experts Suspect The Animals Are Exhibiting This Behavior To Practice Hunting Atlantic Bluefin Tuna

O rcas have been ramming into yachts in the Iberian Peninsula, and experts believe the behavior is due to them practicing how to hunt their favorite food.

It all started back in 2020 when juvenile orcas began hitting and sinking boats. Scientists were unsure whether it was an accident, for revenge, or just for fun.

Now, they are theorizing that young orcas are using the boats as targets to practice hunting Atlantic bluefin tuna.

A team of researchers led by Bruno Díaz López, the director of the Bottlenose Dolphin Research Institute (BDRI), analyzed citizen science data to determine the distribution of orca populations.

Almost half (47 percent) of the 597 records of killer whale occurrences were related to interactions with vessels.

The team used the data to create computer models of the orcas' movements to figure out their seasonal activity. The models showed that the orcas and tunas were influenced by the same environmental factors.

Wherever the tuna go, the orcas are likely to follow. They noted there were seasonal shifts in the orcas' preferred habitats, which corresponded with the migration of tunas.

Different communities of orcas favor different prey. Iberian orcas rely on tuna a lot. Fortunately, Atlantic bluefin tuna are no longer considered to be endangered thanks to conservation efforts protecting them from overfishing.

Since the tuna's numbers have bounced back, the Iberian orcas have more food available to them. They can now spend less time hunting and more time playing around.

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The extra playtime has given them an opportunity to hone their hunting skills. To catch tuna successfully, the orcas must work together because the fish can weigh hundreds of pounds, swim in large groups, and are one of the speediest fish in the sea.

So, orcas will ram to separate an individual tuna from its group. When the orcas have isolated a tuna, they will tire it out and herd it toward shallower waters, where it'll be easier to catch.

The reports of their behavior toward sailboats indicate that the orcas are performing similar actions as they would on a hunt. They ram the fast-moving rudder over and over before attempting to bite it.

Erich Hoyt, a researcher at the Whale and Dolphin Conservation, agreed that the orcas were engaging in playtime. He was not involved with the study. He also does not believe there is a specific aim to the play activity.

"I don't believe the orcas are playing with the rudders just to refine their hunting skills for tuna," he said. "I think their play is more like kids' play, without a set goal but which, in effect, helps building cognitive and physical skills."

Hoyt advises sailors to monitor the orcas' movements and stay away from them in order to prevent more negative encounters. The behavior may gradually decrease over time, just like any trend in our world.

The study was published in the journal Ocean and Coastal Management .

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Killer Whales Are Not Our Friends

Stop rooting for the orcas ramming boats.

In recent months, orcas in the waters off the Iberian Peninsula have taken to ramming boats. The animals have already sunk three this year and damaged several more. After one of the latest incidents , in which a catamaran lost both of its rudders, the boat’s captain suggested that the assailants have grown stealthier and more efficient : “Looks like they knew exactly what they are doing,” he said. Scientists have documented hundreds of orca-boat incidents off the Spanish-Portuguese coast since 2020, but news coverage of these attacks is blowing up right now, thanks in part to a creative new theory about why they’re happening: cetacean vengeance . Now that’s a story!

“The orcas are doing this on purpose,” Alfredo López Fernandez, a biologist at the University of Aveiro in Portugal, told LiveScience last month. “Of course, we don’t know the origin or the motivation, but defensive behavior based on trauma, as the origin of all this, gains more strength for us every day.” López Fernandez, who co-authored a 2022 paper on human-orca interactions in the Strait of Gibraltar, speculates that a specific female, known to scientists as White Gladis, may have suffered a “critical moment of agony” at the hands of humans, attacked a boat in retaliation, and then taught other whales to do the same.

Whatever the truth of this assertion, White Gladis and her kin have quickly ascended to folk-heroic status on the internet. “What the marine biologists are framing as revenge based on one traumatic experience may be a piece of a larger mobilization towards balance,” the poet Alexis Pauline Gumbs tweeted before referring to the killer whales as “revolutionary mother teachers.” Media figures and academics are expressing solidarity with their “ orca comrades ” and support for “ orca saboteurs .” One widely circulating graphic shows a pod smashing a boat from below, above the words “JOIN THE ORCA UPRISING.” (You can even purchase it in sparkly sticker form.) Yet all of this fandom and projection tends to overlook important facts: First, these orcas are likely to be playing with the boats rather than attacking them, and second, if one insists on judging killer whales in human terms, it’s plain to see they aren’t heroes but sadistic jerks.

The recent incidents, none of which has resulted in any injuries to humans, are simply the result of curiosity, Monika Wieland Shields, the co-director of the Orca Behavior Institute in Washington, told me. A juvenile may have started interacting in this way with boats, she said, and then its habit spread through the local community of killer whales. Such cultural trends have been observed before: In the Pacific Northwest, orcas have been playing with buoys and crab pots for years; in the late 1980s, one group of orcas there famously took to wearing salmon hats . Is ramming boats the new donning fish ? Shields believes that theory makes more sense than López Fernandez’s appeal to orca trauma. White Gladis shows no physical evidence of injury or trauma, Shields told me, so any “critical moment of agony” is purely speculative. Also, humans have given orcas ample reason to retaliate for hundreds of years. We’ve invaded their waters, kidnapped their young, and murdered them in droves. And yet, there is not a single documented instance of orcas killing humans in the wild. Why would they react only now?

Read: 7 reasons killer whales are evil geniuses

And though recent events may fit the story of these orcas’ being anti-colonial warriors, you can’t just anthropomorphize animals selectively. What about all the other “evidence” we have of orcas’ cruelty, or even wickedness? Scientists say they hunt and slaughter sharks by the dozen, picking out the liver from each one and leaving the rest of the carcasses to rot uneaten. Orcas kill for sport . They push, drag, and spin around live prey, including sea turtles , seabirds, and sea lions. Some go so far as to risk beaching themselves in order to snag a baby seal—not to consume, but simply to torture it to death. Once you start applying human ethical standards to apex predators, things turn dark fast.

Perhaps #orcauprising was inevitable. Humanity does have, after all, a long history of freighting cetaceans with higher meaning. Moby Dick is, among other things, a symbol of the sublime . The biblical whale—or is it a large fish?—that swallows Jonah is an instrument of divine retribution, a means of punishing the wicked in much the same way some have framed the boat-wrecking orcas. The whale 52 Blue, known as the loneliest whale in the world because she speaks in a frequency inaudible, or at least incomprehensible, to her brethren, has become a canvas for all shades of human sorrow and angst.

Orcas in particular have long been objects of both fear and sympathy, in some cases with an explicitly anti-capitalist tint. The 1993 classic Free Willy centers on a conniving park owner’s scheme to profit off of the bond between a child and a young killer whale. And more recently, the 2013 documentary Blackfish chronicles SeaWorld’s real-life exploitation of captive orcas. The “orca uprising” narrative fits neatly into this lineage. In our present era of environmental catastrophe, Shields told me, it’s appealing to think that nature might fight back, that the villains get their just deserts.

But projection and anthropomorphization are only shortcuts to a shallow sympathy. Orcas really are capable of intense grief ; they are also capable of tormenting seal pups as a hobby. They are intelligent, emotionally complex creatures. But they are not us.

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Orcas Are Ramming Into Ships Off Europe’s Coast

One researcher says this may be a response to a “critical moment of agony” a female orca experienced with a boat

Daily Correspondent

Orcas are highly intelligent creatures capable of mastering new—and often complex—behaviors, such as generating waves to toss seals off floating pieces of ice and coordinating attacks to take down blue whales , the largest animals on the planet.

Now, at least a handful of the black-and-white marine mammals living in the waters off the coasts of Spain and Portugal are seriously damaging ships. And scientists say the animals appear to be learning the behavior from each other.

On May 4, three orcas rammed into a Swiss yacht called Champagne sailing in the Strait of Gibraltar, reports Yacht magazine. After the first bump, crew members thought the vessel had collided with something, but they quickly realized orcas were pummeling the yacht. The situation eventually became so dire the ship’s crew had to call the coast guard, which sent rescuers. As they towed the boat toward a nearby port, it sank from the damage it had sustained.

Werner Schaufelberger, the vessel’s 72-year-old skipper, tells Yacht magazine that the two smaller orcas shook the rudder while the bigger one rammed the ship from the side. After that, the littler mammals mimicked the ramming action, building up speed before hitting the boat. They mainly impacted the rudder, but also hit the keel.

This is not the first time orcas have intentionally collided with ships off the Iberian coast. Since 2020, the sleek animals have sunk at least three vessels in this area, as Sascha Pare reports for Live Science . The sinkings accompany more than 500 other orca-boat interactions that scientists have documented over the last three years.

Still, these incidents account for only a small fraction of boats on the water. Alfredo López Fernandez , a biologist at the University of Aveiro and a member of the Atlantic Orca Working Group, estimates orcas touch just one percent of ships sailing in a given location, per Live Science . López Fernandez also co-wrote a June 2022 paper on orcas interacting with vessels in the Strait of Gibraltar, which he and other marine biologists described as a disruptive and novel behavior.

Scientists are mostly stumped as to why orcas in this region are suddenly attacking ships, but they have a working theory: A female orca nicknamed “White Gladis,” the individual that started this behavior, may have accidentally collided with a boat, become trapped in illegal fishing gear or experienced some other traumatic incident involving a ship. López Fernandez described this possible past event as a “critical moment of agony” that triggered this new, seemingly aggressive activity.

White Gladis is probably not teaching young orcas to attack ships. However, it’s possible they’re picking up on the behavior by simply watching her, López Fernandez tells Live Science . From there, the action has spread, because young orcas consider it “something important in their lives,” he tells the publication.

It’s also possible that ramming into boats is simply a short-lived fad that orcas will eventually move on from. Orcas have adopted other trends in the past, such as swimming around with dead fish on their heads, as NPR ’s Scott Neuman reported in August. Alternatively, scientists theorized last summer that the animals might just be intrigued by moving parts on a ship—or maybe they enjoy the pressure created by a boat propeller and choose to ram into the rudder when the propeller is shut off.

No matter what the orcas’ motivations are, López Fernandez has urged onlookers to avoid applying human characteristics or emotions to the wild animals. Orcas are not maliciously attacking vessels, but rather, they’re simply responding to the presence of a foreign object in their paths. And “not in an aggressive way,” either, he told Newsweek ’s Robyn White last year.

Despite their “ killer whale ” nickname, orcas are dolphins. Males can weigh up to 11 tons and exceed 32 feet in length. But despite their large size, orcas are extremely skilled swimmers and can attain speeds of more than 30 miles per hour .

Scientists consider the orcas living near the Iberian Peninsula to be a distinct subpopulation. Since 2011, the Spanish environment ministry has listed this group as “ vulnerable ,” and since 2019, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has listed them as “ critically endangered .” In 2011, the subgroup had just 39 members .

The orcas living in the Strait of Gibraltar are no strangers to boats. Since 1999, the orcas have been observed lurking around fishing vessels to capture endangered Atlantic bluefin tuna, their main prey. The animals “find a tuna hooked, and then remove the fish before the fishermen can bring it to the surface,” per the IUCN. (Their other primary hunting tactic involves chasing tuna for up to 30 minutes until the fish are so exhausted they basically give up.)

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the strait’s fishermen “hate the killer whales,” as Jörn Selling, a marine biologist with the Foundation for Information and Research on Marine Mammals, told the Guardian ’s Susan Smillie in 2020. And though the creatures are protected, rumors circulate of fishermen intentionally injuring them, such as by cutting off their fins or poking them with electric prods. Within that context, López Fernandez’s suggestion about a “critical moment of agony” prompting White Gladis to start ramming into ships seems even more plausible, though the theory remains unproven.

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Sarah Kuta is a writer and editor based in Longmont, Colorado. She covers history, science, travel, food and beverage, sustainability, economics and other topics.

Orcas have sunk another vessel off the European coast. Why won't they stop ramming boats?

By Audrey Courty

Topic: Whales

A group of three orcas repeatedly hit the rudder of a race boat in June 2023. ( Supplied: The Ocean Race )

The orcas are at it again: for the seventh time in four years, a pod of whales has sunk a boat after ramming it in Moroccan waters off the Strait of Gibraltar. 

The 15 metre-long yacht Alborán Cognac, which carried two people, encountered the highly social apex predators at 9am local time on Sunday, Spain's maritime rescue service said.

The passengers reported feeling sudden blows to the hull and rudder before water started to seep into the sailboat. It is not known how many orcas were involved.

After alerting rescue services, a nearby oil tanker took them onboard and carried them to Gibraltar, a British overseas territory on Spain's southern coast.

Nothing could be done to save the sailboat, which drifted and eventually sank. 

It's the latest incident in what has become a trend of hundreds of interactions between orcas and boats since the "disruptive behaviour" was first reported in the region in May 2020. 

The origin of this new behaviour has baffled scientists, though the leading theory suggests this "social fad" began as a playful manifestation of the whales' curiosity.

Where have orcas interacted with boats?

The latest data from the Atlantic Orca Working Group (GTOA), an organisation that contributes to the animals' conservation and management, shows that there have been at least 673 interactions since 2020. 

GTOA defines interactions as instances when orcas react to the presence of approaching boats with or without physical contact. 

The map below shows the highest numbers of encounters from April to May 2024 took place off Spain's southern coast in the Strait of Gibraltar (red zones), with some lesser activity in surrounding areas (yellow zones). 

The majority of reported encounters with orcas in April and May 2024 took place around the Strait of Gibraltar, between Spain and Morocco. ( Supplied: GTOA )

A 2022 peer-reviewed study published in the Marine Mammal Science journal found the orcas in these areas preferred interacting with sailboats — both monohulls (72 per cent) and catamarans (14 per cent) — with an average length of 12 metres.

A clear pattern emerged of orcas striking their rudders, while sometimes also scraping the hulls with their teeth. Such attacks often snapped the rudder, leaving the boat unable to navigate.

"The animals bumped, pushed and turned the boats," the authors of the report said. 

Adding this week's encounter, there have been seven reported cases of orcas damaging a boat so badly that it has sunk, though the people onboard were rescued safely each time.

In June 2023, a run-in with the giant mammals in the Strait of Gibraltar forced the crew competing in The Ocean Race to drop its sails and raise a clatter in an attempt to scare the approaching orcas off. 

No-one was injured, but Team JAJO skipper Jelmer van Beek said that it had been a "scary moment".

"Three orcas came straight at us and started hitting the rudders," he said.

"Impressive to see the orcas, beautiful animals, but also a dangerous moment for us as a team ... Luckily, after a few attacks, they went away."

After analysing 179 videos and photos of these types of interactions, which lasted on average 40 minutes, researchers concluded there was no reason to classify the events as intentionally hostile behaviour.

"The behaviour of orcas when interacting with boats is not identified as aggressive," they said.

"One of their main motivations has been identified as competition with boats for speed."

Still, the researchers of the study admitted they were not sure what triggered the novel behaviour in 2020.

"We are not yet certain what the origin of these interactions is, but it is still suspected that it could be a curious and playful behaviour," they wrote.

"[The behaviour] could be self-induced, or on the other hand it could be a behaviour induced by an aversive incident and therefore a precautionary behaviour."

Are the same orcas responsible for these incidents?

Out of around 49 orcas living in the Strait of Gibraltar, GTOA researchers found a total of 15 whales  from at least three different communities participated in the unusual interactions with boats between 2020 and 2022.

Most of those that engaged with greater intensity were juveniles, though it's unclear if others have since joined the group.

These giant mammals, which belong to the dolphin family, can measure up to eight metres and weigh up to six tonnes as adults.

The director of the Orca Behaviour Institute, Monika Wieland Shields, has said there is no evidence to prove the theory these whales were seeking vengeance against humans for a past trauma.

"While I'm sure it feels like an attack for the people on board, for the whales themselves, it really looks more like play behaviour," she said.

"There's something intriguing or entertaining to them about this [boat rudder] mechanism and they're just showing a lot of curiosity about it."

Ms Wieland said it's likely this new behaviour spread through the population as a kind of "social fad".

"Orcas are highly intelligent, very social animals, and with that comes a tendency to be curious about and explore your environment," she said.

"One thing that we see are these kind of fad behaviours that will appear in a certain population.

"One whale discovers something, they find it entertaining or interesting, or fun — it's some type of game. And then they will teach that to other members of their family group."

Are orcas dangerous to humans?

While orcas have earned their fearsome reputation for preying on other marine animals, there is no record of them killing humans in the wild. 

In captivity, orcas have killed four people since the 1990s, though it's unclear whether the deaths were accidental or deliberate attempts to cause harm.  

Ms Shields said she was worried the recent interactions between orcas and boats would skew people's perceptions of these mammals.

"I am concerned that people are going to react with fear, potentially injure or shoot at some of these whales," Ms Shields said.

"We really need to educate boaters about the best things that they can do to make themselves less attractive to the whales and the best case scenario would be the whales lose interest in this and move onto something less destructive."

Spain's Transport Ministry advises that whenever boats observe any changes in the behaviour of orcas — such as in their direction or speed — they should leave the area as soon as possible and avoid further disturbance to the animals.

The ministry also states every interaction between a ship and an orca must be reported to authorities.

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Orcas Sink Fourth Boat Off Iberia, Unnerving Sailors

Orcas caused enough damage to sink a yacht in the Strait of Gibraltar last week. A small pod has been slamming boats in recent years, worrying skippers charting routes closer to shore.

By Isabella Kwai

The yacht Grazie Mamma II carried its crew along the coastlines and archipelagos of the Mediterranean. Its last adventure was off the coast of Morocco last week, when it encountered a pod of orcas.

The marine animals slammed the yacht’s rudder for 45 minutes, causing major damage and a leak, according to Morskie Mile , the boat’s Polish operators. The crew escaped, and rescuers and the Moroccan Navy tried to tow the yacht to safety, but it sank near the port of Tanger Med, the operator said on its website.

The account of the sinking is adding to the worries of many sailors along the western coast of the Iberian Peninsula, where marine biologists are studying a puzzling phenomenon: Orcas are jostling and ramming boats in interactions that have disrupted dozens of voyages and caused at least four boats in the past two years to sink.

The largest of the dolphin family, orcas are playful apex predators that hunt sharks, whales and other prey but are generally amiable to humans in the wild . The orcas hunting in the Strait of Gibraltar are considered to be endangered , and researchers have noticed an upsurge of unusual behavior since 2020: A small group of the marine animals have been battering boats in the busy routes around Portugal, Spain and Morocco.

While most interactions occur in the waters of southwestern Europe and North Africa, an orca also reportedly rammed a yacht some 2,000 miles north off the coast of Scotland, according to The Guardian.

“Orcas are complex, intelligent, highly social,” Erich Hoyt, a research fellow at Whale and Dolphin Conservation and author of “Orca: The Whale Called Killer,” said. “We’re still at the early stages of trying to understand this behavior.”

Researchers have pushed back at the idea that orcas are attacking vessels. Instead, they theorize that the rudders of boats have become a plaything for curious young orcas and that the behavior has become a learned fad spreading through the population. Another hypothesis, according to biologists who published a study on the population last June, is that the ramming is an “adverse behavior” because of a bad experience between an orca and a boat — though researchers tend to favor the first.

It is unclear what will stop the ramming, whether it’s playful or otherwise, a point that has left anxious skippers traveling these parts sharing advice in Facebook groups dedicated to tracking such interactions .

“It’s been an interesting summer hiding in shallow waters,” said Greg Blackburn, a skipper based in Gibraltar. Orcas slammed into a boat he was commanding in May and chewed at the rudder, he said, though the vessel was able to return to shore.

The encounter left an impression: On a recent trip to Barcelona, Mr. Blackburn had to pass through a patch where orcas had been sighted the week before. “I genuinely felt sick for about three hours,” he said, “just watching the horizon constantly for a fin to pop up.”

Conservationists, maritime rescue groups and yacht clubs are partnering to navigate the challenge of preserving an endangered population and helping sailors avoid calamity. The Cruising Association, a club supporting sailors, has recommended safety protocols for orca encounters, such as disconnecting the boat’s autopilot and staying quiet. Skippers have offered one another anecdotal advice to deter attacks, including throwing sand into the water and banging loudly on the boat.

Before leaving shore, seagoers can also consult digital platforms that now track reported orca sightings and interactions in the region. This can help them avoid the animals, or chart a route closer to shore, said Bruno Díaz López, a biologist and the director of the Bottlenose Dolphin Research Institute based in Galicia, Spain.

“We suggested the boats stay in shallow waters,” he said, adding that they had noticed more boats changing their journeys. “Maybe the trip takes longer, yes. But it is worth it.”

Mr. Blackburn, the skipper, said he had heard of people resorting to throwing firecrackers into the sea to try to scare the animals away, adding that the boats served as people’s homes on the ocean. “At the end of the day, if you’re protecting your home what are you going to do?”

But the ocean is the orcas’ home, and conservationists say scaring the animals is not a solution.

“It is not about winning a battle, because this is not a war,” Mr. López said. “We need to be respectful.”

Isabella Kwai is a breaking news reporter in the London bureau. She joined The Times in 2017 as part of the Australia bureau. More about Isabella Kwai

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Why are orcas ramming boats? They might just be bored teenagers

Just call them young and restless: The orcas sinking boats off the Iberian Peninsula mean no harm—and media coverage that they’re taking revenge could hurt the rare population.

Off the Iberian Peninsula, a group of orcas have become famous for sinking several vessels—the latest just weeks ago. The predators’ motivations for this odd behavior, which began in 2020, has sparked wild speculation : Are they having fun, avenging humans, or doing something else entirely? Now, experts say they finally know what’s going on.  

In a newly released report , scientists with the International Whaling Commission believe this pod of around 15 animals are most likely mischievous “teenagers."  

To come to this conclusion, the researchers analyzed online footage of orcas engaging in aggressive behaviors, such as hunting. They also studied videos of the animals playing with things like their food, jellyfish, and kelp, and saw no sign of hostility. (Learn five ways orcas are surprising scientists.)

“They approach [a boat] calmly and gently, and it looks like they're playing. They push the rudder gently with the tip of the nose,” says Alex Zerbini , the commission’s scientific committee chair and a senior scientist at the University of Washington in Seattle. “The behavior is very, very different from being aggressive.”

“They don't really know that their playfulness is causing harm… it’s not intentional,” Zerbini says. “When we are teenagers, we do things that maybe we wouldn't do as an adult. We’re more courageous,” he says.  

Rob Lott , campaign coordinator at Whale and Dolphin Conservation, a U.K.-based nonprofit, agrees with this theory.

“This is a solid conclusion that what we’ve witnessed is just a form of play behavior, as alarming it is for the mariners on board,” says Lott, who wasn’t involved in the report.  

The young and the restless

Found worldwide, orcas are incredibly intelligent hunters, and, depending on their habitats, populations specialize in different kinds of prey.

For instance, Australian animals work as a team to kill blue whales, the largest animals on Earth ; Antarctic orcas use waves as a tool to flush seals into the water; and notorious pair in South Africa dine on great white shark   livers.

The Iberian Peninsula population, which has a specialized diet and feeds mostly on bluefin tuna, is listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature as critically endangered , with fewer than 40 individuals left. (See 13 of Nat Geo’s favorite photos of orcas.)

One explanation for why the orcas began sinking boats could be an abundance of their primary food staple. Once endangered because of overfishing, Atlantic bluefin tuna has recently bounced back thanks to the enforcement of sustainable fishing quotas.

“Now that the bluefin tuna has recovered, it makes sense that not only the whales are well nourished, but they have more time on their hands and that's why they are engaging in these more social activities,” Zerbini says.

Seeking play, not vengeance

The report also stresses that describing these encounters as attacks—or pushing the idea that orcas are taking revenge against people—is not only inaccurate but could be harmful to the rare animals. In August 2023, a vessel crew crossing the Strait of Gibraltar fired projectiles at the orcas, which conservationists reported as a crime against the protected species .

“Revenge is clearly not their motivation here,” Lott says, adding that there are no recorded instances of wild orcas killing a person, despite “humans, over the decades, giving them ample opportunities for revenge,” such as hunting them.  

That said, being rammed by an orca—even playfully—can be frightening, which is why experts recommend boats navigate around known orca hot spots in the Strait of Gibraltar, or move away immediately if an animal approaches and let other boats in the area know of their location.

Scientists also plan to experiment with non-harmful measures to prevent the cetaceans from damaging rudders, such as towing dinghies as a decoy or modifying the rudder.

They will also test using a sudden, unexpected noise to deter them. “We've seen that, if you trigger this startle reflex, the animal will move away,” says Thomas Goetz , an animal bioacoustics researcher at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.  

Lott is also confident this teenage trend will fizzle out—and may have already started to, with fewer incidents in 2024. In the 1980s, orcas in Puget Sound, Washington, started carrying dead salmon on their heads like a hat . “That fad disappeared as quickly as it appeared,” he says.  

In the meantime, Lott recommends that people “keep a cool head and take the appropriate advice—and hopefully all will be well for both sailors and orcas.”  

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Study explains why Orcas are attacking boats in the Strait of Gibraltar

13 June 2023 5 minutes

Experts say an orca known as ‘White Gladis’ may be attacking and damaging vessels after being traumatised by a boat injury, triggering a behavioural change that other orcas are imitating

By Victoria Heath

A 2022 study has shed light on the reasons why orcas (killer whales) have been attacking boats in the Strait of Gibraltar, with researchers theorising that the incidents began after a vessel injured a female orca named White Gladis . 

Since the attacks began in 2020, three boats have been sunk and more than 250 damaged by a group of orcas, with the animals appearing to deliberately target the vessels’ rudders.

Of the 35 killer whales in the region, 15 are reported to have been involved in the highly unusual interactions, which experts think began after White Gladis’ behaviour altered in a ‘defensive’ fashion after she suffered a ‘critical moment of agony’ involving a boat collision or illegal fishing entrapment – leading to other orcas damaging passing vessels in response. 

A study published in June 2022 in the journal Marine Mammal Science has found that assaults by the orcas are directed mainly at sailing boats. There is a clear pattern of orcas striking the rudders, with spade rudders the most targeted and damaged type, and then losing interest once the boat has successfully stopped. 

The general movement of the orcas involved in the incidents was from the Strait of Gibraltar to Galicia in northern Spain, with at least one of the groups returning to southern Portugal.

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Understanding why orcas are damaging boats

After analysing over 47 testimonies, 110 pictures, and 69 videos, the study theorises some motivations that the orcas had to interact with vessels: a ‘punctual aversive incident’ such as collision with a vessel; the natural curiosity of the animals; or pressures already identified for killer whales such as prey depletion, boat disturbance and interaction with fisheries.

The study also considered how orcas – which are known to possess high cognitive abilities – are easily able to reproduce behaviour via social learning. In previous studies, the use and transmission of hunting techniques have been investigated in this particular subpopulation of orcas, leading to concerns from researchers that more orcas will eventually learn this new behaviour, aggravating the situation.

But co-author of the recent study, Alfredo López Fernandez , a biologist at the University of Aveiro in Portugal and representative of the Grupo de Trabajo Orca Atlántica (Atlantic Orca Working Group), said it isn’t as simple as White Gladis ‘teaching’ other orcas to retaliate in the wake of her boat injury.

‘We do not interpret that the orcas are teaching the young, although the behaviour has spread to the young vertically, simply by imitation, and later horizontally among them, because they consider it something important in their lives,’ López Fernandez said.

The orcas’ unusual behaviour could also be seen as a ‘fad’ – a temporary behaviour started by one orca and picked up by others before being abandoned.

According to Lòpez, it appears that orcas believe that the behaviour is advantageous , despite the risks associated with swimming near operating boats. Since these interactions first appeared in 2020, 4 orcas have died , although the deaths cannot be directly linked to the orcas’ encounters with boats.

The timeline of orca incidents

‘The reports of interactions have been continuous since 2020 in places where orcas are found, either in Galicia or in the Strait,’  said Lòpez-Fernadez.

Initially, the interactions baffled both researchers and recreational boat users. Rocío Espada, one of the study’s co-authors, who works with the marine biology laboratory at University of Seville and has observed orcas for years in the Strait of Gibraltar, explained her initial reaction to the orcas’ new behaviour.

‘For killer whales to take out a piece of a fibreglass rudder is crazy,’ Espada said in a 2020 interview with the Guardian . ‘I’ve seen these orcas grow from babies, I know their life stories, I’ve never seen or heard of attacks.’

One of the first reported attacks by orcas on a boat in the Strait of Gibraltar was in July 2020, when orcas rammed the hull of a boat that researcher Victoria Morris was crewing for over an hour, leaving the vessel without steering. In the same year, couple Beverly Harris and Kevin Large were motor-sailing their 50ft boat when orcas began to spin the vessel.

The latest of the three sinkings occurred on 4 May, when German skipper Werner Schaufelberger’s boat was so severely damaged by the orcas that it sank while being towed to safety by the Spanish coastguard.

In June, British sailor Iain Hamilton was marooned for several days after the rudder of his boat, the Butey of Clyde, was destroyed by five orcas off the coast of Gibraltar.

The difficult life led by Gibraltar orcas 

A 2011 census of recorded 39 individuals in the Gibraltar orca subpopulation, which today, with 35 members, is classed as Critcally Endangered by the IUCN Red List of threatened species due to a number of factors, including pollution, fishing, food scarcity and sustained injuries.

Orcas are drawn to the area due to the presence of bluefin tuna, a fish also highly-prized by humans, leading to a complex interaction between fishers, orca and tuna. The interaction is often dangerous to the orcas, which are known to ‘steal’ fish from drop lines, resulting while in serious hook injuries to their dorsal fins.

The narrow Strait of Gibraltar is also both a major shipping route and huge draw for whale-watching tours due to the presence of the orcas – leading to the constant threat of boat strikes from the heavy marine traffic.

The future of Gibraltar orcas 

The researchers behind the 2022 study into why killer whales are attacking boat traffic in the Strait of Gibraltar are concerned of the potential impact that this behaviour may have on both orcas and mariners.

‘If this situation continues or intensifies, it could become a real concern for the mariners’ safety and a conservation issue for this endangered subpopulation of killer whales,’ the researchers wrote.

‘There is an urgent need to conduct dedicated research that would help better understand the behaviour of the animals and implement mitigation measures.’

The complete study, ‘ Killer whales of the Strait of Gibraltar, an endangered subpopulation showing a disruptive behavior ,’ by Ruth Esteban ,  Alfredo López et al is published in Marine Mammal Science

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Orcas 'attacking' boats are actually just bored teenagers having fun, experts say

Orcas off the coast of Iberia are spending less time hunting and more time exploring new games thanks to the recent recovery of their favorite prey, Atlantic bluefin tuna.

Orcas that have been bumping boats in Iberian waters for four years are likely just bored teenagers with too much time on their flippers, experts say.

A report published May 24 found that orcas ( Orcinus orcas ) involved in a string of boat-ramming incidents in southwestern Europe are spending less time hunting and more time exploring new games now that populations of their favorite prey have rebounded. At least 673 interactions with boats since May 2020, six of which caused the boats to sink, may have resulted from these orcas having more free time, according to the report.

Something about the rudder on the underside of boats appears to attract orcas, particularly young members of the pod that are generally more curious. Whatever it may be, "as they play with the rudder, they don't understand that they can damage the rudder and that damaging the rudder will affect human beings," co-author Alex Zerbini , a senior research scientist at the University of Washington who chairs the scientific committee of the International Whaling Commission, a global body tasked with whale conservation, told The Washington Post . 

"There's nothing in the behavior of the animals that suggests that they're being aggressive," Zerbini said.

Fifteen orcas are known to interact with boats, most of them young and teenage males, according to the report. These orcas are a subset of the critically endangered Iberian population, which is thought to number fewer than 40 individuals.

Related: Infamous boat-sinking orcas spotted hundreds of miles from where they should be, baffling scientists

A video released May 17 by the Spanish group Conservation, Information and Research on Cetaceans (CIRCE) shows how the orcas break rudders by nudging them with their noses and heads. It remains unclear how the behavior started, but scientists have largely discarded previous suggestions it could be motivated by revenge and now believe it is more likely related to play. 

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An orca may have initiated the behavior after touching the rudder of a boat and feeling it was fun to play with, Zerdini said.

"It's a very dangerous game they're playing, obviously," co-author Naomi Rose , a senior scientist and marine mammal expert at the Animal Welfare Institute in Washington D.C., told The Washington Post. "But it's a game." 

Iberian orcas playing with boats could be linked to a rise in the abundance of Atlantic bluefin tuna ( Thunnus thynnus ), their favorite food, according to the report. Bluefin tuna were previously the target of rampant overfishing, with numbers nosediving to critical levels in the late 1990s and early 2000s, but populations in the eastern Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea have largely bounced back over the past 15 years. 

— Brutal footage shows orca mom and son team up to drown another pod's calf

— Great white shark gets liver torn out by lone orca in under 2 minutes in shocking shift of hunting methods

— Orcas aren't all the same species, study of North Pacific killer whales reveals  

The recovery of bluefin tuna stocks could mean orcas "have all this leisure time on their hands because they don't have to eat every fish they find," Rose said. Ramming boats may be trending in a similar way to previous fads — which include orcas wearing dead salmon as hats and tossing baby porpoises around — but there isn't enough data to determine exactly how the behavior is spreading within the population, according to the report.

Ramming boats may be a game to orcas, but it certainly isn't for mariners. In the report, scientists outlined measures to limit the "satisfaction or reward" orcas gain from interacting with boats. These measures include steering clear of orcas when possible, fitting boats with rudders that are abrasive or bumpy rather than smooth and making banging sounds in the water.

"We don't want to see more boats being sunk and we don't want to see people in distress," Zerbini said. "But we also don't want to see the animals being hurt. And we have to remember that this is their habitat and we're in the way."

Sascha is a U.K.-based trainee staff writer at Live Science. She holds a bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of Southampton in England and a master’s degree in science communication from Imperial College London. Her work has appeared in The Guardian and the health website Zoe. Besides writing, she enjoys playing tennis, bread-making and browsing second-hand shops for hidden gems.

Boat-ramming orcas may be using yachts as target practice toys, scientists suggest

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Yachting World

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Why have Orcas been attacking yachts? A puzzling mystery

• Elaine Bunting
• March 2, 2023

Elaine Bunting looks into the so-called 'attacks' on yachts by groups of Orcas and tries to unravel why it has been consistently happening for the last few years

Late in November last year, Sir Robin Knox-Johnston’s Farr 65 pilothouse cutter, Sanjula , was being sailed 10 miles west of Cape Finisterre in Spain when it was surrounded by orca whales. The collisions began immediately.

“A pod of seven to 10 orcas surrounded Sanjula and then began to barge into its rudder. This eventually broke a steering connecting rod. The engine was switched off and the boat lay hove-to while the emergency steering was rigged,” he reported. “After 10 minutes the orcas moved away, no longer finding a hove-to yacht interesting – but that is only an assumption. The boat sailed to Vigo for repairs.”

The incident was the most high profile yet of what has amounted to hundreds of interactions, or attacks, by killer whales off the coasts of Spain and Portugal since they were first reported nearly three years ago.

The incident involving Sanjula happened just a few weeks after the loss of a French Oceanis 393 , Smousse , 14 miles west of Viana do Castelo. Orcas tore Smousse ’s rudder by mouthing and shaking it, cracking the hull in the process. The four crew were forced to abandon to a liferaft, and were picked up by another yacht.

Close encounters between orcas and yachts were extremely rare occurrences until something very strange happened – in July 2020 the behaviour of a small sub-population of orcas off the coasts of Atlantic Spain and Portugal suddenly changed. They began to barge yachts seemingly aggressively, often causing serious damage to the boats’ rudders.

A towed dinghy could become a target for orca play. Photo: Jon Wright

Reports mounted up as the behaviour kept being repeated, and these incidents spread north, marking the orcas migratory route north along the Iberian peninsula to Galicia, where they feed on bluefin tuna and nurse their young. Whether these were play behaviours or attacks wasn’t clear but it involved repeated ramming of boats, and those who experienced them were terrified.

Delivery skipper Pete Green was delivering an Amel 52 from Gibraltar to the UK in 2020 when the yacht’s rudder spun uncontrollably from side to side.

“We knew there was a risk of meeting some orca so we stayed close to the Spanish coast, but we didn’t see them coming,” says Green, managing director of Halcyon Yachts. “The wheel was just suddenly spinning from left to right as they collided into the rudder.”

The crew immediately turned off all the electrics, shut down the engine, furled the sails and lay ahull. All the advice they’d seen said to sit passively in the water until the whales grew bored.

The orcas circled the Amel slowly for nearly two hours, so close at times that the crew were able to photograph and video the animals. The whole time, the orcas were bumping into the hull, the keel and hitting the rudder. “It seemed like an age before they finally left us in peace,” said Green. By the time the whales were gone, the rudder had been badly damaged.

It was not the first time Green had been on a yacht picked on by orcas. A year earlier, while close to A Coruña on the north-west corner of Spain, the Hallberg-Rassy 36 he was delivering to the UK was “rammed at least 15 times”. The yacht lost steering and had to be towed into port.

These encounters have become an established hazard along this coast. According to reports received and collated by the Cruising Association in conjunction with Grupo Trabajo Orca Atlántica, there were 102 interactions with orcas between January 2022 and January 2023, the majority of them off Cape Finisterre, west of Sines in Portugal, and in the Strait of Gibraltar. See the interactive map, which includes witness reports, at theca.org.uk/orcas/reports

Orcas chewed off this lump of rudder. Photo: Martyn & Zoe Barlow

Some of these resulted in damage, mainly to the rudder, and in a small number of cases it was serious. Some crews say they felt these were aggressive attacks, others viewed it as merely playful. The intent to barge the vessel and try to alter its course was, however, not in doubt.

A rogue group

Dr Ruth Esteban, a marine mammal researcher who works for the Madeira Whale Museum, has spent years studying the abundance, life history and social structure of orcas in the Strait of Gibraltar. The group of whales in question is a small one, she believes, just five pods comprising 28 individuals. It’s an endangered sub-population she knows well and she was both fascinated and alarmed by this bizarre evolution.

Article continues below…

Orca attacks: Rudder losses and damage as incidents escalate

The first signs that something odd was taking place came in July 2020. After the strangest start to a summer…

Whale encounter – there seems to be an increasing number of collisions with whales as yachts get faster

  The first I heard about a sailing boat colliding with a whale mid-ocean was when the 49ft sloop Peningo…

“The orcas were more than used to being surrounded by vessels, sometimes hundreds of vessels at a time, but were never as far as we knew touching the vessel,” she says. “Then when 2020 arrived, after the worldwide lockdown, [this] disruptive behaviour was observed. They were reported interacting with boats and entering into contact with them, particularly sailing boats, resulting mainly in breaking the moving parts of their rudders.”

Since the incidents began, Dr Esteban has collected and reviewed videos taken on board some of the yachts that had been targeted and damaged, meticulously identifying each animal where possible and reviewing the whales’ behaviour. They were mainly juveniles, but there was at least one adult involved, the mother of one of the younger animals.

She observed that they were purposely targeting boats and trying to push them around by pushing or biting the rudder. “We could see the animals come close to the boat at the stern. Sometimes they showed up with intense bubbling. They would approach and start by observing moving parts before touching and pushing to control the movement of the boat.”

The whales mainly targeted sailing yachts under 15m, although some fishing boats, RIBs and motorboats were also attacked. In one case, they broke a yacht’s rudder in half. In another, a yacht crew endured repeated collisions for over an hour as the orcas repeatedly struck their rudder, breaking it and bending the stainless steel shaft by almost 90°. “The cost to repair was almost €21,000,” says Dr Esteban.

Orcas can live in all oceans of the world and are the second most widely distributed mammal on earth. Photo: Mike Korostelev/Getty

A group of working biologists and conservationists from organisations such as the Whale Museum of Madeira, La Rochelle university and the Portuguese Sociedade de Vida Selvagem was formed to investigate this behaviour.

Grupo Trabajo Orca Atlántica ( orcaiberica.org ) collates information on orca attacks, plots where they occur and promotes the conservation and management of the whales. It also offers advice aimed at mitigating damage to yachts or the animals themselves, the so-called orca protocol.

The behaviour, sporadic at first, has become an established set piece for the whales, and it has evolved. It has been going on now for three years, and there is no sign of this behaviour fading. It has become a natural behaviour for this population, and there is no evidence at all that they themselves are acting aggressively.

What can crews do?

If possible, avoid the areas of recent activity. The Spanish authorities set out two exclusion zones last year for vessels under 15m near A Coruña and on the approaches to Gibraltar on a stretch from Bolonia near Tarifa, to Cape Trafalgar. GT Orca Atlántica publishes a map on its website of current orca activity, valid for 24 hours, with the risk expressed in the form of traffic lights. This is based on the latest reports from boat crews and rescue services.

If targeted, GT Orca Atlántica advises stopping your yacht to make your vessel look unexciting and try to quell the whales’ prey drive. They suggest taking your hands off the wheel or disengaging the autopilot to allow the rudder to turn freely and advise crew not to shout at the animals, throw anything at them, ‘and do not let yourselves be seen excessively from overboard’.

Orcas circle a Sun Odyssey 40. Photo: Martyn & Zoe Barlow

But when faced with a pod of orcas and the prospect of hull or rudder damage, some crews have tried to scare them off. “We decided to go against protocol and bang metal tools against our metal railings and stanchions,” says a skipper who encountered the animals last summer.

“That seemed to deter them for about 10 minutes, then they returned. They carried on trying to get as close as possible to the stern again, so we started to play loud music on a portable speaker, banged pots and pans, and waved black and white striped towels off the stern. After a few minutes they left us alone, but the daylight was also dying by then and we can’t figure out if our deterrents worked or if they got bored.”

Some crews have kept bottles of diesel within reach in the cockpit just in case, ready to pour down the cockpit drains in case they are approached by orcas. The theory is that the orcas will be repelled by the mixture emerging underwater from the yacht.

Other crews have tried pouring sand into the water. Some even less humane methods have also been reported, such as crews letting off firecrackers or firing live rounds into the water. These do seem risky, and – aside from the issues of harming a protected marine species – no one can say whether any of these deterrents work.

A bubble curtain created by orcas circling beneath the surface

Three years on from the first reports of this animal behaviour, orca encounters off the Spanish and Portuguese coasts have become an accepted hazard. According to reports collected by GT Orca Atlántica, there were 239 cases of interactions with orcas between 2020 and 2021.

Social media and press reports have hugely amplified the issue. Considering the overall numbers of yachts on passage through these waters, thousands each summer, the percentage of boats affected is still small.

However, it seems unlikely this behaviour will extinct itself – its repetition proves the orcas find it self-rewarding. Are the orcas merely playing? Are they practising hunting behaviours? Are they reacting to stress or changes in food sources? Have pollutants affected them cognitively?

All these theories have been put forward, but no one knows. “Everyone is puzzled,” says Dr Esteban. “We don’t know what is going on and we do not know why they’re doing this. There have been a lot of hypotheses but none of them is based on clear evidence.”

From a yachtsman’s point of view, the reasons really don’t matter. The orcas’ behaviour has evolved, and will presumably continue until it serves no purpose. In the meantime, reported encounters will allow researchers to build up a more detailed picture of the areas of activity, types of boats targeted and successful deterrents, if any. Until then, many cruisers believe the only thing to do is to coast-hop Spain and Portugal while monitoring areas where the orca pods are reported to be hunting.

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Why orcas keep sinking boats

Scientists have some theories why killer whales have seriously damaged boats about a dozen times this year off the coast of Spain and Portugal

In the early morning Thursday, killer whales smashed into a sailboat off the southern coast of Spain, puncturing its hull and damaging its rudder. Spanish authorities raced to save the sinking vessel, according to Reuters , but it was in such disrepair it had to be towed ashore.

It wasn’t the first attack by an orca, or killer whale, off the coast of Spain and Portugal this year. And it may not be the last time one chews a rudder or crashes into a hull. Normally, killer whales aren’t considered dangerous to humans. But pods of killer whales have done serious damage to boats in the region about a dozen times already this year, according to the Grupo de Trabajo Orca Atlántica, or GTOA, a research group studying the region’s killer whales, part of a rise in attacks first observed in 2020.

Stories and videos of the attacks widely shared on social media have turned the orca into a meme. After the marine mammals struck some fancy yachts, some observers are calling the strikes concentrated around the Strait of Gibraltar, where the whales congregate in the spring and summer, an act of anti-capitalist solidarity from “orca comrades” and “orca saboteurs.” For others, the series of strikes is eerily similar to a scene in James Cameron’s latest “Avatar” movie , “The Way of the Water.”

So what is happening? The scientists studying the whales themselves aren’t entirely sure, either. But they have two leading ideas:

Theory No. 1: The orcas are playing around

Closely related to bottlenose dolphins, orcas are highly intelligent and curious marine mammals. Using a series of underwater pulses and whistles, the whales communicate with such sophistication that pods form their own dialects and parents teach their young hunting methods that are passed along for generations.

After learning a new behavior, juvenile orcas often keep repeating it ad nauseam. (In that way, they are a lot like human youngsters.) Playing around is just a part of learning how to be an apex predator.

That matches the pattern of attacks whale scientists have witnessed this year, according to Alfredo López Fernandez, a researcher at the University of Aveiro in Portugal working with GTOA.

In this case, the behavior is “self-induced,” López Fernandez said, and not caused directly by some outside (i.e., human) provocation. “Which means that they invent something new and repeat it,” he added.

But there’s another potential motivation that sounds straight out of “Moby Dick.”

Theory No. 2: The orcas want vengeance

Orcas off the Iberian Coast like to follow fishing vessels to snag bluefin tuna before fishermen can reel them in, putting the aquatic mammals at risk of being struck or entangled. Scientists have seen killer whales in those waters with fishing lines hanging from their bodies.

So it is possible, López Fernandez said, an orca had a bad run-in with a boat in the past, and is now teaching other killer whales how to attack vessels as well. The team suspects a female adult named White Gladis may be the one doing so.

López Fernandez emphasized we don’t have enough information to know the real reason behind the attacks yet. Even assuming the second theory is true, “we don’t know what that triggering stimulus could have been,” he said.

With only 39 orcas counted in 2011, the Iberian orca subpopulation is considered critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The impact that entanglements and boat strikes are having on all sorts of whales and dolphins around the world underscores that humans are a bigger threat to them than they are to us.

“All this has to make us reflect on the fact that human activities, even in an indirect way, are at the origin of this behavior,” López Fernandez said.

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A pod of orcas has sunk a yacht in the Strait of Gibraltar

Ayana Archie

A pair of orcas swim off the west coast of Vancouver Island in 2018. Brian Gisborne/AP hide caption

A pair of orcas swim off the west coast of Vancouver Island in 2018.

For 45 minutes, the crew of the Grazie Mamma felt like they were under attack from below. A pod of orcas had zeroed in on the yacht's rudder as it made its way through the Strait of Gibraltar last week, and rammed it repeatedly, "causing major damage and leakage," according to the company that operated the boat.

Rescuers were able to save the crew and return them safely to port in Tanger-Med on the coast of Morocco. Their vessel, though, sank into the sea.

"This yacht was the most wonderful thing in maritime sailing for all of us," read a statement posted to Facebook by Morskie Mile , the Warsaw-based touring company that operated the boat. "Very good memories will be transferred to Grazie Mamma II. Love of the sea always wins and friendships remain with us."

The company said it is working to ensure its upcoming trips to the Canary Islands go on without a hitch.

Last week's incident was the latest in a string of recent "attacks" by orcas in the waters separating southern Europe and northern Africa — encounters that have left researchers scratching their heads.

Killer whales are 'attacking' sailboats near Europe's coast. Scientists don't know why

Since 2020, there have been about 500 encounters between orcas and boats, Alfredo López Fernandez, a coauthor of a 2022 study in the journal Marine Mammal Science, told NPR earlier this year. At least three boats have sunk, though there is no record of an orca killing a human in the wild.

Scientists have been trying to pinpoint the cause of the behavior.

One theory among researchers is they're just playing around. Other researchers say it may be that the whales like the feel of the rudder.

"What we think is that they're asking to have the propeller in the face," said Renaud de Stephanis, president and coordinator at CIRCE Conservación Information and Research in Spain, in an interview with NPR last year. When they encounter a sailboat without its engine on, "they get kind of frustrated and that's why they break the rudder," de Stephanis said.

Another theory is that the behavior may be some sort of act of revenge due to possibly traumatic , previous encounters with fishing boats.

Revenge of the killer whales? Recent boat attacks might be driven by trauma

"I definitely think orcas are capable of complex emotions like revenge," Monika Wieland Shields, director of the Orca Behavior Institute previously told NPR. Shields said she does not think "we can completely rule it out," even if she was not entirely convinced herself.

Deborah Giles, the science and research director at conservation group Wild Orca, says pods in other areas, such as near Washington state, have been targeted by humans, but haven't shown a pattern of ramming boats.

How wildlife officials saved a humpback whale found 'hogtied' to a 300-pound crab pot

Which underscores why researchers say it's difficult to draw any conclusions from the interactions documented to date. In an open letter published this summer, 30 scientists cautioned against "projecting narratives onto these animals," writing that "In the absence of further evidence, people should not assume they understand the animals' motivations."

Correction Nov. 7, 2023

An earlier version of this story misstated the yacht's name, Grazie Mamma, as Grazie Mamma II.

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Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia

The capital city of Chelyabinsk oblast: Chelyabinsk .

Chelyabinsk Oblast - Overview

Chelyabinsk Oblast is a federal subject of Russia located in the Southern Urals, part of the Urals Federal District. Chelyabinsk is the capital city of the region. It is the place where Europe borders with Asia.

The population of Chelyabinsk Oblast is about 3,419,000 (2022), the area - 88,529 sq. km.

Chelyabinsk oblast flag

Chelyabinsk oblast coat of arms.

Chelyabinsk oblast map, Russia

Chelyabinsk oblast latest news and posts from our blog:.

26 July, 2024 / Magnificent Landscapes of Ayskiye Pritosy .

18 July, 2018 / Bolshiye Pritesy Cliff in the Chelyabinsk Region .

12 June, 2018 / Frosty Dawn in Taganay National Park .

8 June, 2018 / Colors of the Dead World of Karabash .

6 January, 2018 / Chelyabinsk - the view from above .

More posts..

History of Chelyabinsk Oblast

People began to settle in the Southern Urals in the Paleolithic era. Bogdanovka site on the Ural River (Kizilsky district) is the most ancient archaeological site found on the territory of the region (about 70 thousand years). The age of Paleolithic layers in Ignatievka cave (Katav-Ivanovsky district), famous for its wall paintings, is about 15 thousand years. There are numerous archaeological sites of the Stone Age, settlements of the Bronze and Iron Ages.

In the 13th century, the territory of the Southern Urals was part of the Mongol Empire. Kesene mausoleum, preserved to our days near Varna village, is an outstanding monument of the late Horde time. The first Russian settlements in what is now the Chelyabinsk region appeared in the late 17th century.

Administratively the formation of the region began in the 18th century. It was the result of Peter’s I policy aimed at developing producing forces of the country and the expansion of its borders. This was reflected in the activities of the Orenburg expedition. For military and commercial purposes the expedition founded a number of fortresses, one of them was the fortress of Chelyabinsk (1736).

More Historical Facts…

In 1737, Isetskaya province was founded that included the northern part of the present Chelyabinsk region and the Kurgan region. In 1743, Chelyabinsk became the center of the province. In 1744, Orenburg gubernia was formed, it included Isetskaya and Ufimskaya provinces.

In the second half of the 18th century, mining and metallurgical areas of the Southern Urals began to grow rapidly. Several large mining plants were built, which became the basis for future towns. The first towns were Chelyabinsk, Verhneuralsk (1781) and Troitsk (1784).

In the early 19th century, most of the territory of the region was part of the Orenburg gubernia. Since the mid-19th century, Orenburg Cossacks started the rapid development of the steppe areas. New settlements were named in honor of the battles and victories of the Russian army: Varna, Fershampenuaz, Borodino, Paris and others.

After the construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway (1891-1916), the province became the largest transportation hub connecting central Russia, the Urals and Siberia.

In 1919, Chelyabinsk gubernia was formed. November, 3, 1923, Ural Oblast with the capital in Yekaterinburg was formed. January 17, 1934, Ural Oblast was enlarged and was named Chelyabinsk Oblast. Later on, the territory of the region was diminished not once. In 1943, 32 districts were transferred to the newly formed Kurgan Oblast. After that, the borders of Chelyabinsk Oblast remained almost unchanged.

During the Second World War, this region played an important role producing metals, ammunition and military equipment. After the war, Chelyabinsk became the supplier of equipment and human resources for the restoration of Stalingrad, Donbass and other areas of the USSR.

In the 1950s, part of the territory of the region was subjected to radioactive contamination as a result of the accident at the plant for processing waste “Mayak”.

The collapse of the USSR had a negative impact on the economic situation in the region. From 1990 to 2000, rail transportation halved. In 1995, the decline in production in all sectors was 52%, in agriculture - 44%.

February 15, 2013 a relatively large meteorite flew over the territory of the oblast. It became known as the Chelyabinsk meteorite (diameter - about 17 meters, weight - about 10 thousand tons). The meteorite exploded in the vicinity of Chelyabinsk, at an altitude of 15-25 km. Several fragments of it fell in the area of Lake Chebarkul.

Nature of Chelyabinsk Oblast

Summer in the Chelyabinsk region

Author: Olga Yartseva

Chelyabinsk oblast - the land of lakes

Author: Rauer Yury

Wheat field in Chelyabinsk Oblast

Author: Alexander Pridvizhkin

Chelyabinsk Oblast - Features

Chelyabinsk Oblast is located about 1,800 km east of Moscow. The main cities are Chelyabinsk (1,179,000), Magnitogorsk (412,000), Zlatoust (159,700), Miass (150,300) and Kopeysk (145,000). Chelyabinsk and Miass are the stations on the Trans-Siberian railway.

The southeastern part of Chelyabinsk Oblast has the state border - the border with Kazakhstan. The length of the region from north to south - 490 km, from west to east - 400 km. It is comparable to the size of Hungary, Portugal, Austria, more than 2 times larger than Denmark and Switzerland, 3 times larger than Belgium and the Netherlands.

Not far from the station of Urzhumka (8 km from Zlatoust), on Uraltau Pass, there is a stone pillar. On one side it says “Europe”, on the other - “Asia”. The cities of Zlatoust, Katav-Ivanovsk, Satka are located in Europe, Chelyabinsk, Troitsk, Miass - in Asia, Magnitogorsk - in both parts of the world.

Chelyabinsk Oblast has a highly developed industry. Metallurgical, machine-building, fuel and energy, construction, agri-industrial complexes determine the industrial development of the region. Iron and steel industry stands out in the structure of the local industry (about half of the total output).

The city of Magnitogorsk is situated in the middle of one of the largest and richest iron ore deposits in the world. Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works (MMK) is one of the largest steel mills in the world. Makeyev Rocket Design Bureau in Miass is a major supplier of strategic ballistic missiles for the Russian submarine fleet.

Tourism in Chelyabinsk Oblast

Chelyabinsk Oblast has unique natural and climatic conditions: picturesque landscapes, lakes, forests, caves and natural healing springs. It is the main basis for the development of tourism and recreation. Winters are cold and long, summers are relatively hot.

The northwestern part of the region is covered by forests and mountains, the rest - steppes and forest steppes. Forests cover about 24% of the territory. The highest point is Mount Bolshoy (Big) Nurgush (1406.6 meters).

Chelyabinsk Oblast is called “the land of lakes”. There are 3,170 lakes on its territory, 98 of them have areas of more than 5 sq. km., the largest lake - Uvildy - occupies 68 sq. km. The most picturesque lakes are Turgoyak and Uvildy. Many lakes have unique mineral waters and therapeutic muds. There are a lot of health resorts on the territory of the region.

There are more than 200 specially protected natural areas, including Ilmen State Nature Reserve, the historical and archaeological museum “Arkaim”, “Tanagai” and “Zyuratgul” national parks.

Skiing is actively developing. Altogether there are about 20 ski resorts, including “Abzakovo”, “Adzhigardak”, “Zavyalikha”, “Metallurg-Magnitogorsk”, “Solnechnaya Dolina”, which meet the highest European standards and are very popular.

Chelyabinsk oblast of Russia photos

Chelyabinsk Oblast scenery

Horses in Chelyabinsk Oblast

Author: Pavel Kabanov

Author: Kiyanovsky Dmitry

Snowy winter in Chelyabinsk Oblast

Author: Lezin V.V.

Churches in the Chelyabinsk region

Orthodox church in Chelyabinsk Oblast

Author: Alexander Maksimenko

Author: Marina Klein

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