Whale makes epic migration
by Simon Currin 16 Dec 2024 09:44 UTC
Whale makes epic migration © Natalia Botero-Acosta
A whale was seen in the Pacific Ocean off Colombia in 2017, then popped up several years later near Zanzibar in the Indian Ocean - a distance of at least 13,000 km.
A citizen science project has documented the extraordinary distances travelled by an individual whale. The research is published in the journal, Royal Society Open Science and we urge all ocean cruisers to report their whale sightings (for conservation use) using one of the many apps and websites that are available.
The wandering male was among a group of humpbacks photographed from a research vessel on the Pacific coast of Colombia in 2013.
He was then identified in a similar area in 2017 - and off Zanzibar in 2022.
The sightings are separated by a 13,046 km great-circle distance - the minimum distance for the route the whale might have taken, the scientists say, though it is likely to be much greater.
The paper's findings are based on hundreds of thousands of photos of whales submitted by researchers, whale watchers and members of the public to the citizen science website, happywhale.com. The database uses artificial intelligence to match the individual shapes and patterns of humpback whale tails, or flukes, thereby mapping their movements around the globe.
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This article has been provided by the courtesy of the
Ocean Cruising Club.