March 1, 2010
Jean-Michel Cousteau On Orcas
“When you take a wild cetacean (a whale or dolphin) and put it in a tank, its acoustic system is suddenly screwed up. Its sonar reverberates off of the concrete in its tank and, little by little, the animal becomes totally silenced. It’s like a person being blindfolded in a jail cell. The orcas are not used to borders or barriers, and that probably makes them very uncomfortable. Some of them don’t accept captivity and die, but others do and live like they are in prison.”
That’s Jean-Michael Cousteau reflecting on killer whales in the wake of last week’s death of a trainer at Sea World. Cousteau is one of the world’s experts on orcas and gives a fascinating, wide-ranging interview to the Santa Barbara Independent about whales and dolphins in the wild and in captivity, including a description of the enormous effort it took to rehabilitate and free Keiko, the orca that starred in “Free Willy.” It’s well worth a read.