Seaworld trainer attacked and killed..

[draggar]

TelephoneAngel, most of the radio and newspaper stories I've encountered said that her ponytail was hanging in the water, and he grabbed and swam off with it as if it were a new toy. An animal that large doesn't need to be aggressive in order to be dangerous.

But this killer whale *is* aggressive (or at least not very human friendly)- that's why the trainers do not go in the water with him. We've seen him (we were in the audience) several times, we've seen him "clack" at trainers before, we've seen him be a complete @$$hole to the trainers. We've been annual pass holders to Sea World for as long as we've lived in FL and get far more than our money's worth. We've seen him act like this a lot.

I think he was one of the last ones they got out of the wild.

But - eyewitness reports from the crowd said that the whale grabbed her body, not the air (true, it does happen very quickly, but that story was quite consistent). Take a look at a CNN report:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/02/24/kil...ath/index.html

The 40-year-old woman, identified by sheriff's spokesman Jim Solomons as Dawn Brancheau, was in the whale holding area about 2 p.m. when "she apparently slipped or fell into the tank and was fatally injured by one of the whales," he said.

But a witness told CNN affiliate WKMG-TV that the whale approached the glass side of the 35-foot-deep tank at Shamu Stadium, jumped up and grabbed the trainer by the waist, shaking her so violently that her shoe came off.

Granted, it happened during the "dine with Shamu" event so there weren't over a thousand people watching but still at least a couple dozen (I think this event is limited to 50 people?).

You are right, though, they don't have to be aggressive to be dangerous (I was playing with Kiri back in Dec, she missed her toy and got my arm - I spent two days in the hospital).

[wolfie]

Maybe he just bit her ponytail in fun and thats what happened?

TelephoneAngel, most of the radio and newspaper stories I've encountered said that her ponytail was hanging in the water, and he grabbed and swam off with it as if it were a new toy. An animal that large doesn't need to be aggressive in order to be dangerous.

Similar situation to a very friendly Great Dane meeting a toddler. Even if the dog is thinking "Oh boy, another face to lick, another butt to sniff, let me at him", the toddler is likely to get hurt.

[TelephoneAngel]

Ms Brancheau, 40, was killed when she was dragged into a water tank by a killer whale named Tilikum.

She was face-to-face with Tilikum, performing what was called a relationship session, when Tilikum bit down on her ponytail.

"Within the span of two seconds, she was pulled into the pool, unable to get her hair released from his mouth," said Jan Joseph Topoleski, 32, who was at the scene as a SeaWorld trainer-spotter.




sorr to necrothread but reading this on the news today, just a thought, anyone ever done what I do frequently when flossing my teeth, get the floss completely stuck between two teeth and have to pull it out? If her hair really was stuck between his teeth like a large piece of floss, maybe the creature just panicked and swam underwater trying to free it? He wouldn't know it would drown or injure her, he may have panicked.

Maybe he just bit her ponytail in fun and thats what happened?

[draggar]

And they use live seals as throw toys.

So do dolphins

I've always read the "killer" part is due their hunting of whales....I could be wrong...also read there is no record of a wild orca killing a human (than again, that is probably a case of dead men tell no tales, ha)

They are like an aquatic mixture of wolves and cats.....hunt in pods, play with their food before the kill.

And schools of fish (salmon?). They'll herd the school into one thick column and then they'll swim though it and thrust their tail forward (under them) shocking hundreds of them in a single swoop - ready to eat!

All these "tricks" we see killer whales and dolphins do are nothing more than hunting behavior.

[Cat]

I've always read the "killer" part is due their hunting of whales....I could be wrong...also read there is no record of a wild orca killing a human (than again, that is probably a case of dead men tell no tales, ha)

They are like an aquatic mixture of wolves and cats.....hunt in pods, play with their food before the kill.

[RayvenQ]

And they use live seals as throw toys.

[taxguykarl]

Hello they are called killer whales for a reason. I mean these creatures hunt great white sharks!!

[Cat]

I really hope they don't destroy the orca....it wasn't his fault. The trainer knew orcas, and I'd hope she knew the danger. Its sad, of course, but it goes with working with wild animals.

Hell, when I was a kid I dreamt of working with big cats (okay, I still do). Even then, I knew they had claws and teeth and could kill me.


There is going to be a documentary on Animal Planet about people who are killed/mauled by wild critters that work with/"own." I will not be watching (partly because Travis the chimp will be featured)

[CaroPhoenix]

5 reasons Killer Whale may have killed trainer

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Well, you know, that is a very good point. I didn't think of it from that angle.

As for the whale shows, when the Danny incident first went down, his family was looking at suing the park, and frankly at the time I thought that was assinine. After all, it's not like he didn't go out of his way to put himself in the situation and get killed.

Now, I'm not so sure they weren't in the right, simply from the standpoint that these stupid whale shows don't portray whales in the way that they need to be portrayed. They show them as happy, loving trained dogs that love to make their trainers happy. Nothing could be farther from the truth, but seeing the myth Seaworld and their ilk has perpetrated, the skewed, WRONG idea about what kind of animal they really are makes me wonder if Danny (and people like him )simply had some fantasy about what swimming with them would be like. Clearly, he did. However, at this point, I have to say Seaworld is largely to blame for making him think that.

Heck, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that the trainers themselves are a bit deluded.

[Flying Grype]

Why keep dangerous breeds when safer ones would do? Why not Indian Elephants and White Rhinos?

I think the African elephants and the black rhinos are rarer in the wild, which means the more captive specimens there are, the better. In the case of a responsible zoo, nobody's making these animals do tricks, and nobody's going into the cages with the animals more than is necessary for the animals' well-being.

The keepers do it because they are experts in a particular kind of animal, and they know the risks.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

I seemed to remember that whale being involved in the death of another trainer some years back and I looked it up, and yeah. Same whale.

You know, I can see them finding the dead guy in the tank after the fact and not being sure about what exactly happened, although I'm a little curious that there is no security camera footage. No clue what D....you know what, screw it, it's not like I'm protecting his identity, the guy made the fucking Darwin Awards. No clue what Danny was doing in the park. No clue if he was was trying to commit suicide, no clue if he rubbed himself down with a porkchop, no clue if he was antagonizing the whale. So I can kind of see the park hesitating to mark the whale as dangerous...well, any more dangerous than any other whale. Saying an orca is not dangerous is like saying one stick of dynamite is no more dangerous than any other stick of dynamite.

However, I would think the incident would at least make them heighten their awareness of a potential situation.

Now I learn that yeah, this was indeed the same whale that killed ANOTHER trainer earlier on. Which by all accounts the park tried to pass off as "playing".

So basically, they are using a whale that not only may have killed a trespasser, but DID kill an earlier trainer in front of a pack of witnesses in a fucking SHOW???

Seriously?

Okay. Mind blown. I suspect every lawyer within a hundred mile radius is walking around with a tent in their perfectly creased pants. At least, I hope they are. Because someone needs to get sued down to their second layer of skin. This is negligence to the point of being criminal.

I used to work at the zoo here in town. I didn't work with animals. But I often wondered, as did many of my coworkers, why the zoo felt the need to keep extremely dangerous animals such as african elephants and black rhinos. I know what they were paying the keepers, and belive me, it wasn't worth it. We were lucky in that tragedy was averted the times we had close calls. Why keep dangerous breeds when safer ones would do? Why not Indian Elephants and White Rhinos?

[TelephoneAngel]

It appears to be swimming strangely, not floating then moving forward with purpose, but thrashing itself forwards constantly with its tail swirling up the water, as if with difficulty while leaning to one side which would be unatural while trying to swim forwards.

if anyoneone else sees the clip i would like their opinion on this.

There is a second one visible in the clip which glides forwards at a straight angle only flicking its tail occassionally which is how all the others have swum that i have observed either in zoos or on nature programmes.

[Flying Grype]

What are you seeing that makes you think it's ill?

[TelephoneAngel]

on sky uk they are showing a clip of a killer whale with trainers, I am unclear whether it was the whale in question with the trainer in question but assuming it is, the whale in the clip being shown is ill, you can see it clearly.