Orcas make ‘grocery’ trip to downtown Vancouver

A household of slayer whales has made a uncommon travel into waters disconnected downtown Vancouver for what an adept says was apt a “grocery shopping” hunt for harbour seals.

Video shared connected societal media by False Creek Ferries shows the whales cruising past highrise towers astatine the entranceway to False Creek connected Sunday.

The skipper of the ferry, Jack Hemsworth said the passengers connected committee were stunned arsenic the whales’ dorsal fins chopped done the surface. He enactment the motor into neutral arsenic the whales glided by.

“I’ve ne'er been that close, adjacent connected similar a whale watching tour,” said Hemsworth, adding that astatine 1 point, the whales passed wrong 5 feet of his small vessel, which was crossing from the West End successful Vancouver to Kitsilano Beach.

The boats successful the ferry fleet are lone astir 20 feet agelong — smaller than astir big orcas.

Andrew Trites, manager of the University of British Columbia’s marine mammal probe unit, has identified the whales arsenic a household radical of transient orcas consisting of a parent and her 3 offspring.

Trites said the video shows the whales moving softly similar “ghosts” to debar alerting their prey.

“They’re connected the hunt, and truthful they don’t privation to marque a large splash astir it. They privation to travel successful precise stealthy-like, arsenic though they weren’t adjacent there,” said Trites.

“I’m definite determination were hundreds of radical walking on the seawall that time and they didn’t adjacent announcement and these radical aboard the boat, they had a precise peculiar infinitesimal they volition retrieve for the remainder of their lives.”

He said it’s the archetypal clip the 26-year-old parent orca, known arsenic T35A, has shown up successful downtown Vancouver with her children aged six, 11 and 14.

Trites said the well-documented household has antecedently been seen by marine researchers from Alaska to the Strait of Juan de Fuca southbound of Vancouver Island.

He attributes the pod’s astonishing downtown quality to seals besides changing their habits arsenic they fell from orcas, forcing slayer whales to hunt successful backwater areas similar False Creek.

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Killer whales person antecedently been spotted successful False Creek, including successful 2019, and successful 2010 a grey whale swam each the mode to the extremity of the inlet, adjacent Science World.

Trites said researchers are proceeding much reports of slayer whales being seen successful places wherever they’ve ne'er been seen before.

He said the behaviour captured connected the video suggests the whales didn’t drawback anything.

Trites said the sighting was an denotation of the recovered wellness of the Salish Sea, saying it was “in a authorities that we haven’t seen it for implicit a century.”

He likened it to surviving adjacent to Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park.

“It’s a precise healthy, vibrant strategy … we’ve seen humpback whales travel back. We’ve seen our seal numbers retrieve and stabilize,” helium said.

“We spot slayer whales present each azygous time present and erstwhile I archetypal came to B.C., I hardly ever saw a seal, ne'er saw slayer whales successful present and it’s each changed.”

In 2021, the B.C. authorities estimated determination were 206 “mature” transient orcas successful the province’s coastal waters, portion U.S. authorities person enactment the full colonisation astatine astir 350.

The taxon is designated arsenic threatened, meaning they are apt to go endangered without interventions.

But Trites said the colonisation was growing, successful relation with the betterment of prey species, specified arsenic the Steller oversea lion.

As a marine researcher who has been done galore encounters with slayer whales, Trites said those aboard the ferry should consciousness privileged.

“They are magical experiences,” helium said.

Hemsworth, who has worked for False Creek Ferries since 2019, agreed.

“I’m definite they shared each those videos with their friends and family, and it’s thing that they’re gonna hide anytime soon,” helium said.