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The Life of Tilikum the Whale
🕑 Added 2023-08-01 10:15:00 +0000 UTCThere’s one grisly detail you might have heard reported about the death of Dawn Brancheau which isn’t included in this video: that Tilikum “swallowed” her arm during his prolonged attack.
The reason I haven’t included it is simple: it’s not true. Tilikum did sever her arm... but he never ate it. The reason that people think he did seems to be a recording of a 911 call that was placed shortly after her attack, during which a responder incorrectly states that the orca ate her arm.
In actual fact, he simply couldn’t see it in the tank and assumed that it had been eaten – Dawn’s arm was later recovered from the tank. This call was played at the start of the film Blackfish, which is perhaps why so many people think that the arm was swallowed.
It may seem like a small detail, but I think it’s important – the idea that Tilikum ate part of his victim make his actions seem much more predatory. Of course, we can never know for certain what motivated Tilikum… but we can at least be as certain as possible about what he did and didn’t do.
Comments
Fascinating Horror
That's an unusual one. Most pilots take their job so seriously it's hard to imagine them using substances at all. Will give it a look!
Fascinating Horror
The orca habitats, particularly at Sealand of the Pacific, were shockingly small - sometimes just big enough to hold the orcas at the facility. A bathtub isn't far off!
Warhorse
In the wild, these magnificent animals swim 100 miles a day. Imagine their miserable existence in the equivalent of a bathtub, performing unnatural tricks for stupid humans. Each pod of orcas also have their own unique dialect. And they communicate with echolation, it is absolutely fascinating. In captivity, they go mute. It is so sad. RIP Tilikum.
Michael Rutherford
How about a video on Trans-Colorado Airlines Flight 2286? It was a prop plane that crashed in 1988 in the Rocky Mountains, killing 9 of the 17 people on board, including both pilots. As it turns out, the captain actually had cocaine in his system at the time of the crash. Not a lot, mind you. He wasn't flying while high out of his mind or anything. But he had done it recently enough to where it is believed he was beginning to crash from his high and that it was the resulting fatigue that led to the crash of the plane. Here's the episode of Mayday covering the incident: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppBLgPUiSNA
