Death at SeaWorld: Shamu and the Dark Side of Killer Whales in Captivity

by David Kirby

  One morning, some of the group set out into Haro Strait on a boat captained by Spencer Damico to see the Southern Residents. Michael Mountain described the outing on the Zoe Nature site: “I’m hearing crackling voices coming in on the radio saying that the K and L pods are heading south in our direction from Canada. ‘That means we could be really lucky,’ Spencer says. ‘They may all be joining up for a superpod.’”

  Superpods, Michael wrote, were “like orca conventions, with lots of excitement among the whales as they share information, learn about each other and perhaps do things like learning how to live together peaceably.” Younger whales got to meet peers from other pods, “and mothers encourage their sons to ‘go talk to that nice girl over there.’”

  Spencer shut off the engines. Members of K and L pods drew near. “‘There’s one at seven o’clock,’ someone says as we start seeing the orcas surfacing, breathing, then diving again,” Michael wrote. “‘Three o’clock.’ … ‘Five o’clock.’ We soon stop pointing them out—there are just so many of them.” Suddenly, J2, or “Granny,” the matriarch of J pod, now estimated at a hundred years of age, surfaced a few meters from the boat. It was “like getting to meet your favorite celebrity on the red carpet at the Oscars. We’ve actually met the most remarkable orca on record.”

  As the reunion wound down, Jeff remarked how the group was like a bunch of orcas, coming together for a gathering. Sam, after returning home, wrote to the gang that Jeff’s comment had made her think about their group: “We created a whole new version of the Superpod consisting of scientists, researchers, activists, journalists, writers, film-makers, and ex-trainers. We’re a Superpod now, even when we’re not together, but we need a name.”

  Michael Mountain had an idea. “How about ‘Superpod’?” he suggested. “As in ‘The Superpod is meeting at Candace’s.’ If it sounds at all self-aggrandizing, it’s also obviously slightly tongue-in-cheek, so it would work. It’s catchy. And a bit alarming if you’re SeaWorld.”

  * * *

  OSHA’s legal team was almost ready for trial. It had been difficult to secure an expert witness. Even most scientists who had provided written statements to OSHA did not wish to be further dragged into a showdown between SeaWorld and the feds. Dr. David Duffus, the University of Victoria professor who had acted as foreman in the 1991 Keltie Byrne inquest, agreed to testify on behalf of OSHA.

  The government’s list of other potential witnesses was long, including many current SeaWorld employees. Chuck Tompkins and Kelly Flaherty Clark were on it, as were trainers, including Jay Topoleski and Lynne Schaber, who were at G Pool on February 24, and from San Diego, Ken Peters, who was attacked by Kasatka in 2006, and Brian Rokeach, who was attacked by Orkid the same year and had been at Loro Parque when Keto killed Alexis Martinez.

  Three former trainers were also on the list: Jeff Ventre, John Jett, and Kim Ashdown, who had submitted her resignation to SeaWorld Orlando in December of 2009, shortly before Dawn died.

  According to Ashdown, after the Ken Peters incident in 2006, animal trainers were told that only those who wanted to work with killer whales would be sent to Shamu Stadium. “I voiced my preference to not ever move to Shamu Stadium,” Ashdown wrote, but was transferred there anyway. “It was a very intimidating pool to me, not only to be in it with such large animals but to know that I was responsible for other trainers’ lives when an incident occurred. There were several trainers that were asking for a transfer out of Shamu. We were put in life and death situations every moment we were there.”

  Two months before Dawn died, Ashdown once again asked for a transfer. The request was denied. She said higher-ups informed her that “due to admitting my concerns and my anxiety, my performance would be highly scrutinized, and one mistake was grounds for termination.” She informed her bosses that she was neither sleeping nor eating and was “consistently stressed out being at Shamu Stadium,” a situation that could affect safety, she said. “And they told me they were watching.” Ashdown said she could no longer “work for a company that was waiting for me to make a mistake in an environment where life and death hangs in the balance on a daily basis.”

  But even as new legal headaches surfaced for SeaWorld, old ones faded away. On September 7, 2011, SeaWorld attorneys crushed the Connell family of New Hampshire in court. The family had sought damages for their son Bobby’s emotional distress. Judge Julie O’Kane dismissed their suit with prejudice, meaning they could never refile their claim. O’Kane could not find a single case where “a complete stranger” to the injured party was allowed to proceed for emotional distress, she said, calling the family’s legal quest “futile.”

  * * *

  Naomi finished her white paper, “Killer Controversy: Why Orcas Should No Longer Be Kept in Captivity,” in time for the big OSHA trial set for September.10 It was, in many ways, the net product of her twenty years of fighting the industry. “The science is in,” she said in an HSUS statement issued with the report, “and we should realize that nothing—not profit, not education, not conservation—can justify keeping this large, social, intelligent predator in a small box.”

  HSUS said the paper highlighted “the growing body of scientific evidence showing that orcas do not adapt to captivity,” including:

  • Data collected up until 1992 showed captive orcas had higher mortality rates than wild ones; now, new analyses of data up until 2010 had confirmed that the situation had not improved in the past eighteen years “and in fact has worsened.”

  • Captive female orcas were giving birth too young and too often, leading to a higher death rate among both adults and infants.

  • The most common cause of death for captive orcas was infection. Chronic stress might also be an important factor in weakening the animals’ immune response.

  • Captive orcas had poor dental health compared to wild whales, “which may be another factor in their susceptibility to fatal infections.”

  • Orcas in captivity were more aggressive toward each other, and females behaved abnormally toward their calves more often than in the wild.

  • Captive orcas had “seriously threatened the lives and safety of dozens of people,” four of whom had died.

  “The predicted improvement in survivorship [hasn’t] materialized,” Naomi wrote in the report, “despite supposedly continued improvement in husbandry techniques.” The most “parsimonious explanation” was that “orcas are inherently unsuited to confinement.” Kalina, who died at age twenty-five, “set the current upper limit for captive-born orca longevity. No improvements or advances in training, nutrition, veterinary care, husbandry, or transport can ‘fix’ this poor survivorship.”

  The paper called for the gradual phasing out of killer whale displays. “The population of captive orcas can be eliminated through attrition, with the animals currently alive evaluated for continued display, retirement to sea pens, or rehabilitation and possible release to the wild if appropriate.” HSUS was not calling for a “blanket closure of oceanaria,” but a phasing out of orca shows “taking as long as three decades, giving oceanaria sufficient time to repurpose their orca enclosures.” It was simply no longer justifiable to perpetuate orca shows for entertainment, or even for education, “especially when that education is biased toward information that supports a corporate narrative rather than good science.”

  The report concluded, “No more orcas should have to die prematurely. No more trainers should be put at risk. It is time to accept that we have been wrong in our assumptions. The orcas deserve no less.”

  * * *

  September in Orlando can be blindingly hot. Naomi Rose, dressed in shorts and a sun hat, strode through the clinging humidity across the wooden footbridge that led to Shamu Stadium with a friend, Nancy Yates, who lived near Orlando. In town for the OSHA trial, Naomi figured she would visit SeaWorld once more to take in the new “One Ocean” show that had replaced “Believe.” Later that day, they would meet up with Colleen Gorman at the park.

  The show s
eemed unimpressive, Naomi thought, with trainers still doing dry work and bopping around onstage in their sleek ocean-blue wet suits, as if they might dive in with the whales at any moment. It ended with the big splash segment, and Tilikum performed splendidly. He looked strong and healthy, at least from the bleachers.

  Afterward Naomi and Nancy tried to peer through the fence of G Pool, which was undergoing renovation. What appeared to be air bags the size of Volkswagens were being installed in the drained tank. In an emergency, they would inflate and lift the bottom within sixty seconds. If a whale had a trainer in its mouth, rescuers could reach the scene instantly, rather than in the twenty minutes it took to corral Tilikum into the medical pool when he attacked Dawn.

  “This must’ve cost millions,” Nancy said with a grimace. “SeaWorld is definitely going to put their trainers back in the water. They wouldn’t be doing this otherwise.”

  The OSHA hearing was set for the following morning at the modern Seminole County Courthouse, thirty miles north of Orlando in the nondescript suburb of Sanford. OSHA had a difficult time securing a venue: The sensational Casey Anthony murder trial had ended in July, and courthouses were wary of overflow crowds and media-circus disruptions.

  The crowds did not materialize, but the media showed up en masse. TV trucks from local stations fed regular dispatches via satellite to the networks in New York. CNN and Fox News Channel sent crews; AP and Reuters sent reporters. Jason Garcia from the Sentinel also attended. Naomi handed them copies of her orca white paper and conducted several interviews on the courthouse grounds, under the furnace of tropical heat.

  Colleen Gorman and Courtney Vail of WDCS were there, as was a PETA lawyer named Jared Goodman. PETA was about to file a lawsuit against SeaWorld on behalf of its five wild-caught orcas, Tilikum, Katina, Kasatka, Corky, and Ulises, seeking their retirement to a sea pen. Sam Berg, Carol Ray, Howard Garrett, Ric O’Barry, and New Zealand’s Dr. Ingrid Visser were representing the whales as “next friends.”

  PETA’s argumentation was novel, and highly controversial. The group contended that the five whales had been taken from their home and held in “involuntary servitude” in violation of the Thirteenth Amendment to the US Constitution, which prohibited slavery but did not specifically mention humans. SeaWorld had moved to dismiss the case. Some legal scholars and African-American leaders blasted PETA, but a few experts said the suit had merit. “People may well look back on this lawsuit and see in it a perceptive glimpse into a future of greater compassion for species other than our own,” opined Laurence Tribe, the famous Harvard law professor and constitutional scholar.11 Whatever the outcome, PETA claimed, the hearing on SeaWorld’s motion would mark the first time the constitutional rights of animals had been argued in a US court.

  Naomi finished her last interview and gratefully walked into the blast of cold air inside the building. She entered the courtroom and sat down on a hard oak bench. It was going to be a long week.

  The marine biologist nodded hello to OSHA investigator Lara Padgett and waited in silence for the trial to begin. What a momentous year and a half it had been, she thought. The media glare, the various investigations, the congressional oversight hearing, Tim Zimmermann’s exposé articles, the radio and TV debates, the ex-trainers and whistle-blowers stepping forth, the lawsuits and the general public awareness about killer whales had reached critical mass. None of this would have transpired before Dawn died. It was hard to believe it had transpired at all.

  Now an extraordinary courtroom drama was about to unfold. It had the potential to forever change the way SeaWorld did business. Captivity was not on trial here. Important as the hearing might be, it was limited to the safety of SeaWorld trainers who performed with orcas in the water. While an end to water work might chip away at SeaWorld’s revenue, it would hardly deliver a fatal blow; trainers had been out of the water for nineteen months and Shamu Stadium was still packing them in.

  Naomi did not hate SeaWorld, nor did she wish to see the place closed down. Her opposition centered on cetaceans in captivity, but other things about SeaWorld were worthy. The manatee exhibit was educational, for instance, and the little-known aquarium was exemplary: Beautifully designed and filled with exotic species, it also had well-lit signage explaining interesting facts about each type of fish in the tank.

  Naomi had no doubt that some children were inspired by their SeaWorld visits to learn more about marine mammals and conservation, or even to become marine biologists. She knew about SeaWorld’s animal rescues and grants for habitat restoration. She knew about the educational materials, some of them flawed, including the Ask Shamu web page that had kid-friendly information on orca diet, coloration, and size. But did the rescue of manatees and production of high-tech materials actually justify the confinement of killer whales to watery cell blocks?

  SeaWorld supporters implied that because of human activity the ocean was now too dangerous; it was no longer a fitting place for killer whales to live. Captivity was thus an important undertaking. SeaWorld argued that whales living in pools helped whales in the wild by raising awareness, boosting conservation, and allowing research on captive animals in their corporate collection.

  But how much of those efforts were really benefiting wild killer whales? Why were the Northern Residents still threatened and the Southern Residents endangered? How much did people actually learn about saving the whales, and what, exactly, was SeaWorld doing to help J, K, and L pods recover?

  At the company’s website, a few general conservation tips were given, such as “never flush medications or put harmful chemicals down the drain” and “always recycle plastic.” Another way to salvage the sea was to “throw an ocean party [or] make some sea-themed jewelry.” SeaWorld also suggested that people “meet a marine animal” because it was easier to care about animals “once you’ve felt a personal connection to them.” Meanwhile, a literature search Naomi directed revealed just under thirty papers on SeaWorld orcas. At least half of them pertained to husbandry issues, with little bearing on wild whales.

  In contrast, conservation materials at the Vancouver Aquarium (which, ironically, no longer housed orcas) were hard-hitting and thorough. They provided detailed science on the threat to orcas from declining food supplies, pollution, vessel traffic, and human-caused noise. Yes, the ocean had grown more perilous for killer whales, the aquarium was saying. But unlike SeaWorld, it was also telling people specifically what they could do to reverse the trend.

  The whales were not a lost cause whose only salvation was public display. The aquarium urged people to join the British Columbia Wild Killer Whale Adoption Program to “help support important research on wild killer whales and their conservation!” People could assist salmon habitat by supporting one of the Streamkeeper groups; they could reduce marine debris through the Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup, or help marine conservation groups “teach others about protecting the oceans and the whales.”

  The message was clear: The answer to problems such as pollution and orca-habitat spoilage was not to build a Noah’s ark of “human care.” The answer was to heal the sea.

  Species can and do come back, Naomi knew, and perhaps the Vancouver Aquarium’s efforts were having an impact: In the previous five years, the Northern Resident community had experienced record population growth, despite all its challenges.

  Back at SeaWorld, killer whales had over the decades generated billions in profits for the company and its investors. If SeaWorld had returned a good portion of that accumulated wealth into fighting pollution in Puget Sound, or helping salmon rebound by tearing down dams or eliminating fish farms, Naomi knew her mission would have been undermined. Opponents might accept captivity if the profit from orca display went toward saving orcas in the ocean. But that wasn’t the case.

  It was time for the beginning of the end, Naomi and so many of her allies felt. In show business, most performance animals were allowed to retire, to live out their lives in quiet dignity, freed from the daily routine of working for
food, posing for cameras, or doing backflips on command. They had worked hard, performed well, and kept people employed. They had earned their retirement.

  But at SeaWorld, whales were expected to perform virtually until they dropped dead. It was grossly unfair, Naomi thought. It was inhumane.

  And look at how these noble animals died—so many of them prematurely, so often with gastric diseases, immune deficiency, shattered teeth, or deformed fins, despite their world-class veterinary care. Some were lost in brutal acts of aggression or self-injury, some in agonizing childbirth, and some from the unlucky bite of a disease-laden mosquito. One orca died when a gate crushed his skull. Was it any wonder they perished at two and a half times the annual rate of their free-ranging cousins? For that matter, was it a wonder that some of them harmed their trainers?

  To Naomi, her allied scientists and activists, and ex-trainers such as Jeff Ventre and John Jett, the best solution was to end breeding programs and gradually retire captive orcas to sea pens—where they could still receive food, care, and human attention, but also live a more normal life in a more natural environment. Some might even become semi-independent, like Keiko. SeaWorld itself could run the sites and charge people to watch the whales swimming, foraging, breaching, and resting, though not performing triple bows and rocket launches.

  Sea pens would be good for the whales, good for the public, and good for SeaWorld.

  Meanwhile, technological advances in animatronics were now at the stage where robotic orcas might replace living ones. Robots required no food or veterinary care. They could perform all day long. They could take guests on thrilling rides at a cash premium for SeaWorld. And they would be highly entertaining to watch—even in a society saturated in entertainment options. Perhaps most important, robot Shamus would never hurt each other, or any people.