Orcas have attacked a boat crewed by a team of sailors taking part in an around-the-world yacht race.
A Dutch team competing in the Ocean Race, usually held every three or four years, had a terrifying encounter with a notorious group of orcas that has been terrorizing boats in the Strait of Gibraltar, at the southern tip of Spain.
Video footage posted to Team's JAJO's Instagram page shows two orcas, also known as killer whales, swimming towards the yacht.
The orcas start approaching the back of the boat, only seeming curious at first.
But then underwater footage shows an orca heading straight for the rudder of the boat. The orca then appears to bump the rudder with its head.
The orca stays close to the rudder as the other orca circles the yacht.
The orca continues to investigate and bump the rudder before eventually swimming off into the distance.
"Twenty minutes ago we got hit by some orcas," the Dutch team's skipper, Jelmer van Beek, said in the video, following the incident.
"Three orcas came straight at us and started hitting the rudders. Impressive to see the orcas, beautiful animals, but also a dangerous moment for us as a team. We took down the sails and slowed down the boat as quickly as possible and luckily after a few attacks they went away... This was a scary moment."
Orcas in the Strait of Gibraltar and off the Iberian coast have been causing problems for years but they have intensified in recent months. The orcas always seem to aim for the boat's rudder, although it is not certain why.
The animals have been targeting sailboats there since 2020. These encounters have ranged from orcas simply approaching boats to actively interfering with them.
A sailor who has been ambushed twice by the same pod of orcas says the killer whales are refining their strategy. Captain Dan Kriz, a delivery skipper with Reliance Yacht Management, had his first orca encounter in 2020, when a pack of orcas caused significant damage to his boat's rudder. Three years later, what Kriz believed to be the same group of orcas attacked a boat he was delivering again.
"Local scientists who have worked with killer whales in this region for more than two decades have had closer looks at incidents, and so far I think it is fair to say that we do not know why these accidents and attacks are happening," David Lusseau, professor of marine sustainability at the Technical University of Denmark, previously told Newsweek. "The individual whales seem to engage in the same pattern of attack, focusing on the rudder which can lead to the vessels being immobilized."
The orcas have even sunk boats before, though this remains rare. Even if the boat stays afloat, some sustain significant damage to the rudder.
Although orcas are not usually dangerous to humans, they are huge animals and fierce predators meaning they are able to inflict severe damage on boats.
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