Orcas Spotted Off of LA Coastline

Though they are routinely found in the waters off of California, large marine mammals like killer whales don't usually come so close to shore - it seems they prefer to stick to the farther side of the channel islands.

But yesterday, a small pod of killer whales was found in the waters between Palos Verdes and Santa Catalina Island.

KABC-TV had some nice footage of the pod:


Can't see this embedded video? Click here to watch!

Amazing that this comes on the same day that a lone grey whale was spotted in the Mediterranean Sea, off the coast of Tel Aviv!

(h/t: LAist)

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Cool. How long has it been since we've ended commercial whaling? How long beore the ocean has even half the whales that it had only 3 years ago?
A grey whale in the Med? That is astonishing and very good news. But imagine it means it's probably not alone and the fact that they aren't seen anywhere else suggests we overestimate our capacity to survey the ocean's inventory of even really big animals. I hope a genetic sample is collected from its inevitable whale snot/poop. Could it be that they'd been in some corner of the Atlantic all this time?