Behind the Scenes at Sea World
As a young child, going to the zoo or aquarium is a magical experience. Seeing these huge animals that you would never encounter in your day to day life, and knowing they can’t hurt you, makes it a great place to go to when it’s nice out. But have you ever stopped to think about how captivity affects the animals? To seem informative, employees at the zoo will tell you false statistics about how animals are living longer in captivity, or how they are eventually going to release their animals back into the wild. The documentary, Blackfish shows a video of this happening at Seaworld. One clip shows a trainer telling tourists that their orcas live longer than wild orcas; however, the orcas held captive by Seaworld have an average lifespan of 20 years, whereas in the wild, they have a lifespan of about 70-80 years. Since 1977 Seaworld has bred 70 orcas, and not a single one lived past 30. In addition to these whales, 30 more died before they were born.
One of the obvious cons of having animals in captivity is the confined space. Orca whales are held in 150 by 90 foot pools despite the fact that in the wild they swim up to 140 miles in one day. It would take over 4,000 laps around the tank for them to swim a comparable number of miles to what they swim in the wild, basically turning them into couch potatoes. The minimal space has caused a very noticeable condition in most captive male orcas: a collapsed dorsal fin. When people asked about it, Seaworld said this condition is common in the wild and in captivity, but in the wild, collapsed dorsal fins only occur as a result of significant injury.
Something Seaworld doesn’t address is that orcas fight. In the wild, an orca whale is able to swim away when being attacked by another whale, but the small tanks make this impossible, and often lead to injury or death. It is believed that in the wild, orca whales have different languages, similar to humans. When Seaworld mixes all these whales together, a miscommunication is bound to happen . This was made clear in 1989 when a whale named Kandu was being protective of her child. When another whale came near, Kandu immediately attacked her. The other whale came out of the attack fine, but Kandu suffered many injuries and later died from blood loss.
When Seaworld was being created, they had to capture whales, so they decided to go for the babies since they would be cheaper to ship. Tons of people in speedboats followed a pod of orcas until they were close enough to catch them. They threw a giant net around all of the babies, and while the parents gave their best efforts to rescue their kids, they were defenseless. In the wild, whales typically stay with their mothers for their entire life, but these whales would never see their parents again. During these captures, more than twelve whales ended up dead.
The most striking outcome of keeping whales in captivity is that the whale trainers can end up severely injured or worse. In 1991 a 20-year-old trainer slipped into the pool and after many attempts of escaping, she ended up drowning because two orcas wouldn’t let her go. 8 years later a man snuck into the park at night and in the morning his dead body was discovered draped over one of the orca’s, Tilikum, who is known to be especially aggressive. In 2009, a 29-year-old trainer working at a park in Spain was hit by a whale so hard that he went unconscious and drowned. Only 1 year later, a very experienced trainer was in the pool with Tilikum when he suddenly pulled her underwater and started tossing her around in his mouth. After enduring a fractured neck, broken jaw, and a dislocated elbow and knee, she died. There has never been a reported incident of someone being killed by an orca whale in the wild. Of the 153 incidents involved with captive whales, four have resulted in death.
Hearing about these terrible incidents might make you wonder why nothing was done. When Seaworld was asked questions about the death of the extremely experienced trainer, Dawn Brancheau, they said that she broke several safety protocols, however, there are witnesses and footage showing something completely different from what the public was told. Instead of doing anything, Seaworld chose to pretend nothing happened and moved on.
The main thing that people are left wondering is why. If no orcas have killed people in the wild, why have four people lost their lives to whales even after training with them for years? Seeing an orca whale up close is an amazing and rare experience but considering what the whales are put through, it probably isn’t worth it. From the tiny environment, to being separated from their families, it’s no wonder that they might be a little angry.
By Violet Kottke