Maybe They Are Just Pissed Off?

On a number of occasions here, I have said, "Do not f%$# with corvids,  (Crows and Ravens) because they are extremely intelligent, engage in sophisticated actions as a group, including multi-generational vendettas, etc.

It looks like, I will need to add this recommendation to orcas, (Killer Whales) who have taken to sinking boats off of the coast of Spain.

I'm not sure whether this is as a result their pod members being killed by fishing nets, or by the extremely aggressive Spanish fishing practices (strip mining in the ocean), but something has definitely gotten them angry:

In the early morning Thursday, killer whales smashed into a sailboat off the southern coast of Spain, puncturing its hull and damaging its rudder. Spanish authorities raced to save the sinking vessel, according to Reuters, but it was in such disrepair it had to be towed ashore.

It wasn’t the first attack by an orca, or killer whale, off the coast of Spain and Portugal this year. And it may not be the last time one chews a rudder or crashes into a hull. Normally, killer whales aren’t considered dangerous to humans. But pods of killer whales have done serious damage to boats in the region about a dozen times already this year, according to the Grupo de Trabajo Orca Atlántica, or GTOA, a research group studying the region’s killer whales, part of a rise in attacks first observed in 2020.

Stories and videos of the attacks widely shared on social media have turned the orca into a meme. After the marine mammals struck some fancy yachts, some observers are calling the strikes concentrated around the Strait of Gibraltar, where the whales congregate in the spring and summer, an act of anti-capitalist solidarity from “orca comrades” and “orca saboteurs.” For others, the series of strikes is eerily similar to a scene in James Cameron’s latest “Avatar” movie, “The Way of the Water.”

So what is happening? The scientists studying the whales themselves aren’t entirely sure, either. But they have two leading ideas:

Yeah, the two theories are that the whales are just roughhousing, which I find unlikely since they target things like rudders which are calculated to disable boats, or vengeance.

………

Orcas off the Iberian Coast like to follow fishing vessels to snag bluefin tuna before fishermen can reel them in, putting the aquatic mammals at risk of being struck or entangled. Scientists have seen killer whales in those waters with fishing lines hanging from their bodies.

So it is possible, López Fernandez said, an orca had a bad run-in with a boat in the past, and is now teaching other killer whales how to attack vessels as well. The team suspects a female adult named White Gladis may be the one doing so.

López Fernandez emphasized we don’t have enough information to know the real reason behind the attacks yet. Even assuming the second theory is true, “we don’t know what that triggering stimulus could have been,” he said.

Stealing their food, injuring and killing their loved ones, what could possibly motivate them?

Set up a marine sanctuary and give them some space.

After a few years, they will probably mellow out a big.