Posted on 09/20/2025 11:58:45 AM PDT by nickcarraway
Like from a horror movie, in a chilling escalation of ongoing orca-boat interactions, a yacht belonging to a Lisbon-based sailing club sank off the coast near Costa da Caparica on Saturday, September 13, in the afternoon after being repeatedly rammed by a pod of killer whales, according to Portuguese maritime authorities and eyewitness accounts.
A second vessel attempting to help the crew was also damaged in a separate incident nearby, leaving crews from both boats requiring rescue operations. The events, captured on video and widely shared across Portuguese social media, show the persistent and growing threat posed by these highly intelligent marine mammals in the region’s waters and reopen questions into why they are doing it.
Yacht sinking by killer whales started early without warning The initial attack occurred around 12.30pm local time, approximately five nautical miles off Fonte da Telha beach, south of Lisbon. The yacht in question, a sailboat from the Nautic Squad club in Oeiras, suffered such serious damage to its rudder and hull after just “two or three knocks” from the orcas, a nearby dolphin-watching tour skipper who diverted his vessel to help said, “I saw the sailboat moving erratically. Then I realised it was being attacked by an orca,” Filipe told the Portuguese newspaper Notícias ao Minuto. He said that the interaction lasted only minutes but was absolutely devastating: “We tried to refloat it, but the damage was too great, and it slowly sank because too much water was entering… Everything took a little more than an hour—about five minutes of interaction, then the time for water entering and the boat sinking.”
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EasyJet passenger dies mid-flight on holiday trip to Lanzarote The National Maritime Authority (AMN) confirmed that lifeguards from the Cascais station and the Lisbon Harbour Master’s Office were mobilised immediately, making sure all aboard were safe and no medical assistance was needed at the time.
Another yacht attacked by killer whales on same day Compounding the drama, a second sailboat with five people aboard was struck by orcas about five nautical miles away, off Fonte da Telha. Its rudder was shattered, rendering it unsteerable, though the boat remained afloat. The AMN reported that it was successfully towed to the port of Oeiras, with crew members reported as physically well and uninjured. Authorities stressed that in both cases, the crews had already sought refuge on assisting vessels by the time rescuers arrived, averting any immediate danger to human life.
The incidents are part of a troubling increase in orca encounters in Iberian waters since 2020, with over 700 documented cases involving the critically endangered Iberian subpopulation of killer whales. While most interactions result in damaged rudders and immobilised yachts rather than sinkings, the Caparica event is one of the rare full losses of a vessel, exposing the risks for sailors in the Strait of Gibraltar and adjacent coastal areas. These encounters with orcas rose to 207 in 2023 before declining to 136 in 2024 and just 67 so far this year, possibly due to new guidelines from Spanish authorities to encourage vessels to stay in shallow waters (less than 20 metres) or avoid notorious hotspots altogether. However, the worrying persistence of attacks, often involving a small group of orcas led by individuals like the female known as White Gladis, continues to alarm naval experts, marine biologists and sailors.
What could be causing killer whale attacks on yachts? Marine biologists have speculated that the behaviour could come from a mix of factors, including playful social learning among juveniles, curiosity toward boat rudders, or responses to environmental stressors such as depleted bluefin tuna stocks and habitat disruption. More controversially, some researchers point to intensified military sonar activity in the region since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, which has ramped up NATO naval patrols through the Strait of Gibraltar. High-intensity sonar, used for anti-submarine warfare, is known to cause hearing damage, disorientation, and behavioural changes in cetaceans like orcas, potentially leading them to lash out at civilian vessels as proxies for the painful noise sources.
Recent similar events back up this pattern. Just two weeks ago, a pair of orcas attacked two boats off the coast of Galicia, Spain, prompting a Spanish Maritime Rescue ship to tow the damaged vessels to harbour. And in July 2024, British yachtsman Robert Powell shared harrowing video of his boat, the Bonhomme William, capsizing in the Strait of Gibraltar after an orca assault, forcing him and two companions to await coastguard rescue.
Attract them with those old LP records of whale songs they used to sell. Or the soundtrack of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home with the same.
The bumper sticker reply to Save the Whales....
Their Orca be a law against this....
Oh yes, on porpoise...
(Here comes da Grammer Nazis...LOL 🤣😆)
Guess da Dolphins’ Gone Golfin’ 🏌️🏌️♀️🏌️♂️⛳
I guess seal bombs are unknown outside commercial fishing circles.
Some of us have a problem with humor which entails plays on words and puns. I’m not one of them. 😇
There’s a word for what we do:
Paronomasia: The technical term for punning, which relies on the phonetic similarities between words for a humorous or rhetorical effect.
I wonder if you put a full magazine of 556, 30 rounds worth into one of these animals if it would deter them and they would stop doing that to the boat. Or would it not matter. Or worse just piss them off ,not sure.
They are upset about global warming....How Dare You!!!
Paronomasia
Oh yeah, I love that on a BLT
MUCH better than Miracle Whip
Play Yoko Ono
Or Slim Whitman (works on Aliens from Outer Space 🌌🌌🌌)
You’d likely hit vitals, and kill at least one. They aren’t stupid animals...I think they’d break off the attack. Seal bombs wouldn’t kill, but I think they’d deter.
You’re onto something, I think. I’ll try some. 🥪
Fighting against the wind farms the only way they can.
At least they are not sharks.
Looks like it had lunch too?.
40mm grenade launcher.
The thing is though man they got like 6 to 8 inches of blubber if I’m not mistaken. And I’m sure you’ve seen some of those ballistic tests where they take high-powered rifles and shoot them into like clear gelatin to simulate organic tissue, and it doesn’t seem to go much further than 6 to 8 inches
I think the blubber is less around their head but then again I’m wondering if you’d penetrate the skull. Although if you did, I know they got big brains so you might score a lethal headshot who knows.
All I know is I’m a boater on the East Coast and I can really feel for these people who are getting attacked by these orcas and having that behavior spread to the East Coast without doing anything about it would piss me off
I said it in another thread earlier this week and talked about the same event that that this pod needs to be culled.
Well, they’d have parts exposed to the air. If attacking. I think rock salt would get their attention. Birdshot certainly would. Saltwater stings wounds.
Shooting one of these critters with .556 would probably just piss it off.
It might be that these orca’s see these boats as trespassing into their territory.
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