MONTEREY (CBS SF) – Dramatic footage shows a group of killer whales methodically ram, isolate and kill a gray whale calf passing through Monterey Bay with its mother, on Saturday. The graphic attack was captured in its entirety on video by Monterey Bay Whale Watch, a company that organizes whale-watching excursions for groups led by marine experts. The company posted the video on Facebook with a warning, and says this is the first time an attack was caught on video from start to finish. In the clip, a small pod of killer whales can be seen moving in just below the surface. The young whale desperately tries to escape while the mother rolls over to protect her baby, but the outcome is inevitable. The killer whales will have their meal. It took about four hours for five orcas to batter and kill the calf, even as its mother tried to defend it. The pair were traveling to Alaska during spring migration. Whale Research Institute Director Joe Renard tells KPIX 5 the gray whales travel in groups. “With the migration of 22,000 grays off our coast, they move in groups of mothers with babies, teens, singles,” explained Renard. “Adult Males all go at different times.” Whales are seen in greater numbers in San Francisco Bay too. Ferry boats are constantly on the lookout. “We’ve seen them in high traffic areas and in really shallow water,” said ferry deck hand Jason Blare. “The last one the skipper and I saw, we saw it right off the Berkeley Pier in 12 feet of water.” Renard said with the large number of gray whales offshore, it was unlikely the orcas would need to chase anything past the Golden Gate Bridge into the Bay. Renard said the attack captured on video was simply an example of “the circle of life.” “It’s wildlife. It’s nature,” said Renard. “The California coast is super rich in wildlife and this is not really unexpected,” said Blare. Experts say Monterey Bay is especially dangerous for gray whales at this time of year. Killer whales frequent the area searching for food as the grays travel through during spring migration to Alaska.<doc-sep>WARNING: This story and video contains graphic information about an orca attack on gray whales. A group of killer whales known as a “friendly pod,” killed a gray whale calf on Wednesday off Carmel in an unrelenting and coordinated attack that those who observed it said was hard to watch. This was the second recorded attack in the Monterey Bay area in four days. Both hunts were recorded on video by Monterey Bay Whale Watch, which uses drones to record marine life. The attacks are not wanton aggression. Most orcas feed on other marine mammals, and gray whale calves are considered a valuable food source for the killer whales. The pod, identified as CA51, is well known to researchers, marine biologists and whale watchers in the Monterey Bay area. It is called a friendly pod because of its benign curiosity of boats. CA51 includes an adult female, “Star,” her two adult sons and a young daughter. Another pod in the area includes Star’s daughter and grandchildren, which were responsible for Saturday’s attack. Star’s pod led Wednesday’s hunt. Monterey Bay Whale Watch, which conducts whale watching tours and collects information on sea life, saw the four orcas traveling south, just west of Carmel Bay, and observed as the orcas saw a cow and her calf swimming nearby. They made a beeline for the gray whales at rapid speed. Nancy Black, marine biologist for Monterey Bay Whale Watch, described what happened next: As the gray whales turned toward shore and shallower waters in an attempt to escape, the orcas blocked their way and began ramming the whales. The mother whale flipped on her back and managed to get her calf on top of her, holding the baby out of reach of the orcas. The mother performed this maneuver several times, but the orcas were relentless and eventually separated the calf from the mother. They then focused their attention on the young whale, pushing it under and then ramming it from below. Related Articles Monterey Bay: Video of killer whales attacking gray whale calf, mother Endangered killer whales make an appearance in Monterey Bay There’s one animal great white sharks are really afraid of The orcas killed the calf and then began to eat it, something that took about eight hours to complete. Black says Star is an excellent hunter. Black has studied Star for more than 30 years, first observing her in 1992 as the orca joined in on an attack of a gray whale calf. In those three decades, Black says she has witnessed Star and her family hunt many others over the years. “We witnessed one of nature’s greatest battles,” Black says. The orcas are not year-round residents of Bay Area waters, but they are reliable seasonable visitors, usually making an appearance in the spring. The orcas, which are classified as toothed whales, are apex predators. No other creature in the ocean preys on the orcas, and researchers recently discovered that even the great white shark fears the killer whale.<doc-sep>
MONTEREY — A family group of five killer whales hunted and killed a gray whale calf as it passed through Monterey Bay on Saturday with its mother, a four-hour attack captured on video. Monterey Bay Whale Watch, which captured the attack on video, said the incident Saturday marked the first time the company has filmed a killer whale attack from start to finish with a drone. “We were watching the killer whales near the south canyon edge of the canyon as they zig zagged back and forth when suddenly they rapidly sped up and pounced on the mom and calf gray whale pair,” Nancy Black, a marine biologist and owner of Monterey Bay Whale Watch, wrote in an e-mail. The gray whale mother and calf were migrating north to Alaska and passing through Monterey Bay, Black said. “This area is one of the most dangerous parts of their long migration from Mexico to Alaska as killer whales frequent Monterey Bay during the gray whales’ spring migration and patrol the canyon edges looking for them,” said Black, who has studied killer whales for over 30 years. Related Articles Endangered killer whales make an appearance in Monterey Bay There’s one animal great white sharks are really afraid of Killer whale season in the Monterey Bay In the video, the killer whales are seen repeatedly working as a team to ram the calf and separate it from its mother. Black said the mother gray whale “struggled to protect her calf from these powerful predators.” The video was provided courtesy of Monterey Bay Whale Watch/Gowhales.com.