Meet Lolita, The World's Loneliest Orca

This is Lolita, she's lived in a confined tank for 45 years at the Miami Sea Aquarium and has not seen another orca since 1980.

She lives in the one of the smallest tanks in the world for a captive whale. Orca's are highly intelligent and social animals and in the wild she would swim up to 100 miles a day; however Lolita only has space less then 60 x 80 feet to live in.  The confinement is apparently so stressful and abysmal that the only other orca at Miami Sea Aquarium, Hugo, years ago "repeatedly smashed his head into the walls of the tank and killed himself".

However, Lolita was not born in captivity, she once had a family. On 8th August 1970 she was caught from the ocean in Penn Cove, Puget Sound, Washington, USA. She was one of seven young whales sold to marine parks around the world from a roundup of around 90 orcas.

 

The orcas were stalked and herded into a three acre net by deafening explosions, speedboats, and airplanes. Alongside the captors, was a young marine mammal researcher Terry Newby. Dr. Newby notes that "confined and desperate the orcas looked for a way out" their "frantic cries reverberated over the cove and were heard for miles." Dr. Newby says that:

                                      HE CAN STILL HEAR THEIR SCREAMS TODAY

 

Lolita was torn from her mother inside the pen using speedboats and nets. She was pulled closer and forced into a sling, never to return. The baby orcas were then sold around the world, including Sea World, to perform and die in tiny cement pools.

 

 

 

During the 15 years of capture in Washington and Columbia 257 to 307 whales were caught. 55 were transferred to aquariums, 12 or 13 died during capture operations. The rest died.

 

Lolita is the only Orca still alive from the capture; sadly she has spent the last 45 years of her life imprisoned in a pen performing every day for humans.

 

But Lolita's time enslaved is hopefully coming to an end. Her family, the Southern Resident Orca population has been classified as endangered and the government has agreed that Lolita should be included in her family's Endangered Species Act listing and receive the same protection from harm. This inclusion would open the door for her release from the Miami Sea Aquarium and return her to her home waters.  Hopefully she can be free once again.

 

 

 

With your help, she can be released. Spread the word and sign the petition here:

https://www.change.org/p/free-lolita-help-this-wild-orca-trapped-in-a-tiny-concrete-tank-for-decades


An article by Harry Wright:

References:

http://www.seaworldofhurt.com/orca-capture/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dG1evYAGak

http://uk.whales.org/blog/2014/11/brief-history-of-southern-residents

http://www.orcanetwork.org/captivity/lolitacapture.html