Free Republic

Just about everyone with access to a 24-hour news channel has seen the home video of a killer whale attacking his trainer at a Sea World facility in San Antonio. The whale, named Ky, is seen repeatedly trying to submerge his trainer of 10 years—in front of a shocked audience which turned out to see a seemingly innocuous event called the Shamu Adventure. No doubt trying to dismiss the attack as a simple rush of randy hormones, the trainer has publicly labeled it the actions of a teenage whale nearing breeding age. To which we would say: That's exactly the...

Check out this cool video of a penguin doing all he can to keep three or four Orca killer whales from making him their lunch. After about a minute of going to and fro to escape the clutches of their jaws, the penguin decides to take his chances with the humans instead. So before they know it, the people in the raft have a guest and he does not seem to be in too much of a hurry to jump back into the water. Eventually the whales decides to head back out to see if they can find other...

SeaWorld in San Diego has canceled its Shamu whale show at least for Wednesday after an Orlando SeaWorld employee was killed in an encounter with a whale at that theme park. "We're terribly saddened by the loss of the member of our SeaWorld family, it doesn't matter what park," said SeaWorld San Diego spokesman David Koontz. "We have canceled our afternoon Shamu show here today." Koontz said park officials had yet to make a decision about to whether to cancel Thursday's show. Orlando SeaWorld officials are not revealing the identity of the victim, although a local TV station is reporting...

Orlando, Florida - A person was found dead Wednesday after an incident inside Shamu Stadium at SeaWorld Orlando. Emergency personnel were called to the park and found a person dead, according to Orange County Fire Rescue spokesman John Mulhall. The death was not the result of a natural death, he said. Our partners at WKMG in Orlando say witness Victoria Biniak said she saw a trainer thrashed around by a whale from a viewing area, although that has not been confirmed by park officials. "The trainer was explaining different things about the whale.. and then the trainer that was down...

A SeaWorld employee died this afternoon during an incident at SeaWorld's Shamu Stadium, following an incident this afternoon at the Killer Whale attack, an Orange County Sheriff's Office official confirmed. Neither SeaWorld, rescue personnel or the Sheriff's Office are confirming the identity of the employee, although a local TV station is reporting that a female employee was killed after she was grabbed by one of the theme park's whales at the start of a public show. Park guest Victoria Biniak told Local 6 that the trainer was a veteran of SeaWorld and had just finished explaining to the audience the...

A member of SeaWorld Orlando's family of killer whales and his trainer swim to the surface during the show 'Believe.' (SEAWORLD) One person is dead at SeaWorld's Shamu Stadium, following an incident this afternoon, an Orange County Sheriff's Office official confirmed. Orange County Fire Rescue responded to SeaWorld's Shamu Stadium this afternoon on report of a person who was not breathing. Details about the incident are not yet available, but a Sheriff's Office official confirmed it is a death investigation. A local TV station is reporting that a female trainer was killed after she was grabbed by one of the...

Folks, if you need a break from reading about Obama and other related crap, check this out.It is amazing, funny and a little hair-raising all at the same time!I think it is one of the most remarkable nature videos I have ever seen, because it showed sheer animal athleticism, tenacity, endurance, most hilariously, inventiveness.It showed beyond a doubt that animals have an understanding of their relation to us. Anyone who has owned a dog or cat knows that, but to see it in wild animals that have a one time encounter with these particular humans is completely remarkable.

Albatrosses fly many hundreds of kilometers across the open ocean to find and feed upon their prey. Despite the growing number of studies concerning their foraging behaviour, relatively little is known about how albatrosses actually locate their prey. Here, we present our results from the first deployments of a combined animal-borne camera and depth data logger on free-ranging black-browed albatrosses (Thalassarche melanophrys). The still images recorded from these cameras showed that some albatrosses actively followed a killer whale (Orcinus orca), possibly to feed on food scraps left by this diving predator. The camera images together with the depth profiles showed...

ANCHORAGE - The white killer whale spotted in Alaska's Aleutian Islands sent researchers and the ship's crew scrambling for their cameras. The nearly mythic white whale was real after all. "I had heard about this whale but we had never been able to find it," said Holly Fearnbach, a research biologist with the National Marine Mammal Laboratory in Seattle who photographed the rarity. "It was quite neat to find it." The whale had been spotted once years ago in the Aleutians but had eluded researchers since, even though they had seen many of the more classic black and white whales...

December 8, 2006 San Diego, California There was recently an incident that illuminated the inhumane treatment of innocent creatures at one of the country's leading theme parks, Sea World. It seems that a captive killer whale at the San Diego park named "Kasatka" had pulled one of its trainers underwater during a performance in an apparent cry for help. It must also be noted that Kasatka had bitten other trainers before, further pointing to the obvious effects of abusive treatment suffered by the fish/mammal/whatever-it-is. Scooter and I knew we had to help this poor thing before it went crazy and...

Killer whale breeches among a group of ocean kayakers, creaming one in the process.

SEATTLE (Reuters) - Killer whales in the Pacific Northwest's Puget Sound should be protected as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act, government scientists said on Thursday. "Our recovery efforts are already under way for these killer whales," Bob Lohn, head of the National Marine Fisheries Service's northwest regional office, said in a statement. The orcas, a pod of 84 that spends several months of the year in the frigid waters of Washington state's Puget Sound, are currently protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Designating the pod as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act will extend...

Oslo — Keiko, the killer whale star of the Free Willy movies has died, his caretakers said early Saturday morning. The whale, which was 27 years old, died after the sudden onset of pneumonia in the Taknes fjord in Norway on Friday afternoon. His animal-care specialist, Dane Richards, said the disease struck the cetacean fairly quickly. “He exhibited some signs of lethargy and lack of appetite,” Mr. Richards said early Saturday morning. Mr. Richards said Keiko's illness was sudden and veterinarians had monitored his progress but the whale died quickly. “We checked his respiration rate and it was a little...

SEATTLE - "This is very severe hemorrhaging." Ken Balcomb says new pictures of the brain of a harbor porpoise that died in Puget Sound last May are very telling. The pictures show signs of severe trauma. "This is another smoking gun for me that we've got a consistent trauma here," says whale researcher Balcomb. Balcomb says the evidence convinces him that Navy sonar killed the porpoises. Government scientists examined 11 porpoises that washed ashore. But they won't release any evidence until all the lab results are in. They tell KOMO 4 News that will take at least two more months....

Keiko's keepers are preparing once again to introduce him to migrating wild whales, with whom the retired orca film star might frolic and bond. And those same keepers are romancing whales of their own: members of the public with money to share, and well-endowed environmental groups, with whom they might financially bond. As it searches for ways to keep the multimillion-dollar whale reintroduction project afloat, Ocean Futures, the California-based nonprofit that cares for Keiko, has put the Humane Society of the United States at the top of its dance card. With 7 million members, a $60 million budget and a...