Tag: tokitae

On August 8, 1970 Lolita (Tokitae) was captured in Penn Cove, Whidbey Island, near Puget Sound, off the coast of Seattle, Washington.  Four baby whales and a young mother drowned during this capture.  The young mother and four calves had their belly’s slit, filled with rocks, weighted down with chains, and anchors, and then sent to the bottom of the Ocean.  This was done so people wouldn’t learn of their demise and the public outrage which would follow through media attention.  Today that is banned and illegal.

Forty years after her capture, she is the only remaining living Orca from that capture.  She has been completely alone since 1980, when a young male named Hugo died in the tank with her.  Lolita remains in the same tank built in the 1960s by the Miami SeaQuarium; now called “The Whale and Dolphin Stadium.” The tank is 35 feet wide and 80 feet across.  This tank is illegal under USDA/APHISstandards which require a killer whale enclosure to be at least 48 feet in all directions.
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