smiling-for-iker

The moment a 25-ton humpback whale pushed a snorkeller to safety from a 15ft tiger shark was captured on camera. Biologist Nan Hauser was swimming off the coast of Rarotonga, in the Cook Islands, when the giant creature swam in to prevent a “potentially deadly” attack. Hauser said the encounter may be proof of a whale’s intuitive nature to protect other species, including humans. The giant whale tucked the 63-year-old, under his pectoral fin and pushed her along with his head and mouth for around 10 minutes, she said.She later realised that the 15-foot tiger shark was nearby, that the whale was steering her away from. 

“I’ve spent the past 28 years protecting whales, and in the moment, I didn’t even realise that they were protecting me,“ she added.

Hauser had heard of the altruistic behaviour of humpback whales before - protecting their young, other species of whales, seals, and dolphins - but scientists have never seen humpbacks actually protecting humans. Such actions, however, have been previously witnessed in dolphins. Hauser said: "There is a published scientific paper about humpbacks protecting other species of animals, by Robert Pitman. For instance, they hide seals under their pectoral fins to protect them from killer whales. They truly display altruism - sometimes at the risk of losing their own lives.”

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10 Reasons Why Orca Whales Should NOT be at Seaworld (Or Any Marine Park)

In the wild, orcas swim up to 100 miles a day. They are confined into a small tank in captivity. 

Their collapsed dorsal fins (pictured above) are a sign of an unhealthy whale. All male orcas in captivity have a collapsed dorsal fin. Less than 1% of orcas have this condition in the wild.

Orcas do not live up to their nickname “killer whale”. There has not been one incident of an orca killing a human in the wild. However, in captivity, orcas have killed 3 humans and injured 151 reported injury incidences.

On average, orcas live up to 50 years old in the wild. Some females have been reported to live 80-100 years old. Seaworld’s average orca life span is 13 years old.

Family is important to orcas. In the wild, their pods include generations upon generations of their family. Marine parks do not keep their families together. In fact, babies are taken from their mothers. This is psychologically traumatizing to the whales. 

Whale fights are common in the tanks because they are not in their pods and they are, literally, mentally ill. In a tank, whales can’t flee from fights like they can in the wild. These whales get brutally injured and sometimes killed by other whales in the tank.

Pods have their own languages. In a tank with other whales who have different languages. Imagine living with somebody who speaks a different language with you and you cannot use hand motions. Frustrating right?

Not only are the tanks in marine parks WAY too small for this wild animal, in the wild, marine mammals live in a habitat full of MANY other marine plants and animals. In captivity, they live in a cement, chlorinated tank.

Since 1961, 141 whales have been captured. 125 of these whales have died.

The brain of an orca is 4 times larger than the human brain. It has been confirmed their intelligence matches to ours, if not more.

Just imagine living in cement room with a few other people who don’t speak your language. Imagine not knowing if you will ever see your family again. Imagine being forced to do performances for others and being fed one thing for the rest of your life. Imagine being confined in a cement room when there is a whole world out there to explore.