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Whale Suffered Fatal Injury During Fight

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Times Staff Writer

Kandu died from a freak injury caused when the killer whale, showing “normal behavior,” attacked a larger female whale she was attempting to dominate, Sea World representatives said Tuesday.

Sea World veterinarian Jim McBain said that Kandu, who weighed about 4,600 pounds, attacked Corky, her 7,000-pound rival, during Monday’s 4 p.m. show at the park. McBain said trainers saw the whales fight in a holding tank behind the main pool midway into the 25-minute show.

The trainers reported seeing Kandu charge into Corky with her mouth open. The impact fractured Kandu’s upper jaw, causing fatal hemorrhaging of major arteries in the whale’s nasal passages, McBain said. The veterinarian said there was nothing that could be done to save Kandu.

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As thousands of spectators watched, Kandu spouted blood that stained the water and the sides of the tank.

“The altercation was initiated by Kandu. She was asserting her dominance by going after Corky with her mouth open,” McBain said. “It’s common behavior. For the survival of any species, the stronger animal has to rule. The death was an unexpected shock, but the altercation was not a rare event at all. It was normal behavior.”

Although Sea World characterized the whale death as an accident resulting from normal whale behavior, critics took the opportunity to reopen the debate over whether the mammals should be kept in captivity.

“I don’t know if anyone knows what the hell is going on in these synthetically created pods,” said Dennis Kelly, a marine biology professor at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa. “Given what’s happened, it’s obvious that Sea World doesn’t understand.”

The Show Goes On

On Tuesday, Sea World executives briefly considered canceling the park’s trademark whale shows. But McBain said the suggestion was rejected when trainers argued that it would be better for the remaining three whales “if we continued with a normal day.” The shows continued Tuesday morning, though without trainers in the pool.

Many park visitors interviewed Tuesday in the killer whale stadium said they were unaware of Kandu’s death. Park officials said they are now in their peak season, and attendance was normal Tuesday.

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According to McBain, the fatal encounter between the whales only took about five seconds, but Kandu lingered for about 45 minutes before she died. Kandu made headlines last September when she gave birth to Baby Shamu during a Sea World show. The birth was videotaped and the marine park has been using it in its advertising campaign.

Despite the fact that Baby Shamu was still nursing, Sea World executives said they are confident that Kandu’s death will have no adverse effect on the young whale. McBain said Baby Shamu is eating about 40 to 45 pounds of solid food a day and is staying with Corky at night.

“Obviously, she (Baby Shamu) realizes that something is different. She appears to be awaiting her mother, but we think she’ll do all right at the end,” McBain said.

Corky, who is believed to be in her mid to late 20s, suffered superficial cuts but was otherwise unhurt in the collision, McBain said. Kandu was believed to be 14 years old and had given birth in 1986 to a baby that was stillborn.

Sea World officials said that Kandu had repeatedly exerted her dominance since Corky was brought to the park three years ago when Marineland in Palos Verdes was closed. Although Corky was older and heavier, Kandu was regarded as the dominant female in the 5-million-gallon tank that includes Knootka, a 7,500-pound female believed to be in her late 20s. Baby Shamu, who is 11 months old and also a female, weighs about 1,000 pounds.

The social structure of killer whales is dominated by females, and the only males allowed in a pod are transient breeders and babies. McBain said it is natural for a younger female like Kandu to assert her dominance over an older one like Corky.

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McBain said that at first it was not apparent to the trainers that Kandu had been injured in the brief confrontation with Corky. No trainers were in the water when the fight occurred, Sea World executives said. For about two minutes after making contact, the two mammals chased each other in the main pool but did not touch again, McBain added.

At that point, trainers and thousands of spectators in Shamu Stadium saw blood streaming from Kandu’s blowhole. While one trainer directed Kandu and Baby Shamu back to the holding pen, another stayed with Corky, McBain said.

“While people in the back ascertained what was happening, he (the trainer) went ahead and did four more procedures with Corky,” McBain said.

Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, owner of the four Sea Worlds and two other theme parks, is currently looking for a buyer to take over the attractions. Analysts and HBJ officials downplayed the financial impact of the whale’s death and its possible effects on the sale of the parks.

They pointed out that Sea World has 16 other whales, including five calves born in captivity over the last two years. Kandu, who was valued at about $1 million, was not insured.

A necropsy was done on Kandu Monday night. McBain said veterinarians found nothing unusual with the whale’s internal organs. The necropsy revealed that Kandu “was a very, normal healthy female.” He said it will be another 2 1/2 months before the final necropsy results are known. Meanwhile, tissue samples will be sent to marine laboratories in the United States for study. Scientists will also study her brain, and her skeleton probably will be donated to a natural history museum, McBain said.

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Kandu’s death was the second whale fatality at Sea World in less than a year. Orky, a male whale who accompanied Corky to San Diego when Sea World bought out Marineland, died last September, three days after Kandu gave birth to Baby Shamu. Orky sired Baby Shamu. A necropsy revealed that Orky, at about 30 the oldest killer whale in captivity at the time, died from natural causes brought on by old age.

Mark Wofford, a Long Beach resident who was visiting Sea World Tuesday, said he was surprised to hear of Kandu’s death but had already made plans to visit Sea World. The whale’s death did not affect his perception of the aquatic park, he said.

“These whales probably get treated better here than in the wild,” Wofford said. “In the wild, they’d probably have to fight things like oil slicks and other pollutants that people put in the water. At least here the water is clean.”

Although aquatic parks portray killer whales as playful pets that nuzzle their human trainers and perform graceful acrobatics, marine biologists still know relatively little about the social structure that governs the highly social mammals.

Lack of Knowledge Alleged

Some marine biologists complain that marine mammal experts lack the knowledge needed to safely keep whales captive.

Other marine biologists argue that humans will be unable to study the whales unless they are kept in tanks. “The nice thing about raising whales where we can see them is that we can answer questions like” what happens to a calf after a mother’s death, said Deborah Duffield, a marine biologist at Portland State University.

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Although marine biologists differ on whether the animals should be kept in captivity, “it’s important to remember that we only witness about one-eighth of their total behavior,” said Marilyn Dahlheim, a biologist with the National Marine Fisheries Service’s National Marine Mammal Laboratory in Seattle. “A lot goes on, but we don’t see it under water.”

Kandu’s death “had nothing to do with their being maintained in a bad fashion,” Duffield said. “It was an animal action with an unfortunate consequence. It was not behaving in any abnormal way.”

Sea World’s marketing department might characterize the killer whales as cute and affectionate, but “these animals have long been known to be top-line predators,” Duffield said. “They . . . eat other marine mammals, (and) they are aggressive killers in the wild.”

Aggressive Play

That behavior can continue in captivity, where whales tend to “play fairly aggressively,” Duffield said. “And, when they (turn) aggressive, they can be very aggressive.”

Kelly complained that, although Sea World has featured killer whales in performances for 25 years, “they’ve never published anything about social interactions” in scientific journals.

Researchers do know that females typically play a dominant role in whale pods found in the wild.

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“What we don’t know is whether . . . this interaction between the two females was play that got out of hand or a mother being aggressive” in an attempt to protect her calf, Duffield said. “It might have been a mother saying . . . I’m (angry) . . stay away, don’t bug me now.”

What Sea World’s scientific staff now must determine is “why the jaw broke,” Duffield said. “They also will have to watch the other females to learn if it was an isolated instance, an accident, or . . . (if) it means they’ll have to keep the moms and babies separate so they’ll never have” another incident.

Once the accident occurred Monday, there was little that park employees could do, Duffield said. “It would have been obvious that something was wrong,” Duffield said, because whales’ blowholes contains many blood vessels, “just like a human’s nose. (Kandu) happened to have ruptured a big enough blood vessel” to cause death, Duffield said.

“Once a whale goes down, you’re really in trouble,” Duffield said. “Remember, you’re dealing with a many-ton whale.”

‘Unfortunate Incident’

“There’s so much yet to be learned,” Dahlheim said. “This is an unfortunate incident, but we have to learn the most from it.”

Sonny Allen, training director of marine mammals at Marine World in Vallejo, which has two killer whales, said, “Out in the wild, it’s very (common) for a younger female to try an establish dominance” over an older female in the matriarch. “You see dorsal fins missing, skin marked up . . . it’s always the younger one trying (to overcome) the big one.”

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“This kind of thing goes on in almost any type of animal structure,” Allen said.

Allen complimented Sea World for rapidly communicating the death to the rest of the marine mammal world. “There was a drastic change in their communicating with other aquaria and other trainers,” Allen said.

In the past, Sea World remained quiet after accidents that might generate bad publicity, Allen said. “I think through peer pressure from people in the business . . . they learned that information like this has to be shared and not hidden away,” Allen said. “I’ve been very impressed with their response.”

Times staff writers Anthony Millican and Chris Kraul contributed to this report.

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