West Seattle Whale Watch video: Orcas! Seen from Beach Drive

| Seen at sea | West Seattle news | Wildlife

ORIGINAL 2:32 PM REPORT: Just got a message from Jeff Hogan – orcas headed northbound, spotted near Southworth (on the ferry run with Fauntleroy). Get those binoculars out! 3:47 PM UPDATE: Just back from Beach Drive, where we caught sight of them from Constellation Park (as did others nearby with binoculars and/or hands-shielding eyes)- they were closer to the Bainbridge side than the West Seattle side. Checking to see if our video came out! 4:09 PM: It did – and we have just added it to this report. A bit shaky/blurry but we were zooming all the way to almost-Bainbridge, and it’s just a standard-issue small handheld. More whales than we thought we were seeing, squinting at the camera in the sunshine! 8:20 PM UPDATE: For a closer look – here are two photos just shared by Terry Wittman, taken from Southworth:

Cheryl October 11, 2009 (2:45 pm)

Argh! Missed them again. :-(

Andrea October 11, 2009 (3:17 pm)

thanks so much! got the binocs and have been watching them from beach drive (they are all the way over but visible) for 10-15 minutes! awesome!!

Rhonda Porter October 11, 2009 (3:36 pm)

what a thrill! I could see them from our telescope and I did get a photo but it’s pretty weak unfortunately.

Terry W October 11, 2009 (7:31 pm)

I was at Southworth when they came through – probably 3 pods, maybe 50 whales total – absolutely incredible. Lots of breaching and tale thumping.

Stan Adams October 12, 2009 (6:58 am)

Great movie and pictures!

Doug October 12, 2009 (7:16 am)

Thats Always Some of The Most Beautiful Scenery and Orca’s Ever……

wseye October 12, 2009 (7:47 am)

Wow! Those are amazing photos with WS in the background.

beachdrivegirl October 12, 2009 (8:37 am)

That is amazing!!

Mike October 12, 2009 (9:54 am)

Awesome, great to see this.

Jamie October 12, 2009 (10:19 am)

Man thats soooo awesome!!! How is it that we paid money to go and see them and we didnt see any that day but here we live in west seattle and could have seen them for free!!! One of these days I WILL see them swimming around =) Thank you for the AWESOME pics

Bill Robison October 12, 2009 (11:08 am)

I was on a Argosy boat coming back from Blake Island yesterday.
The entire boat had sailed directly into the middle of the “super pod” of Orca whales numbering in the dozens and dozens and ,yes, EVEN MORE DOZENS of Orcas swimming, splashing, breaching and schooling in every direction we looked. …….As this was happening it was being explained to by the resident Marine Biologist on board that once in a GREAT while there are 3 or more giant pods of whales join together and become a massive “Super Pod” as they are known and are able, by sheer numbers and amazing hunting techniques, are able to create a very effective Salmon herding, collecting and eating machine able to hunt in a GIANT ORCA WHALE PACK….He actually knew some of these whales and was able to identify the pods and its individual whales
( a lot of whom were named and well documented by him)
Mother and her Calf surfaced and played in the waters 25 feet away on the port side. I have no words. This went on for the good part of 45 minutes. We were actually stopped for a good deal of time in the middle of the Puget Sound as there were so many whales that it was unsafe to continue even at a slow crawl. We sat still in the water just a very few yards from the Coast Guard vessel that was making sure all boats were complying with International Law concerning wildlife protection.
I have never seen an Orca whale in my life. Today I saw 50 to 100 whales swimming in and around our boat and surrounding waters.

IT. WAS. INSANE. POWERFUL. The Captain of the boat pointed out that she had NEVER seen anything like this and it was highly unlikely for this to occur again IN HER LIFETIME!!!!! We were assured by every member of the crew on that vessel that this was an extremely rare and phenomenally powerful day for all of them.
Life is good when it throws you an amazing curve ball that lets you really appreciate the best things without warning.

What a gift!
How cool and powerful!
I’m still walking on air and probably will be for a while to come.

Bruce October 12, 2009 (12:14 pm)

Thanks to WSB tweet, we watched from home for hours as the super pod moved north past Alki Point (we’re at 1st and Broad downtown) and along Blake Island. We saw the Argosy boat departing the breakwater and finding themselves in the midst of the whales.

We’ve been in and out of the breakwater many time, and can only imagine what the crew and passengers were experiencing. As the pod(s) continued north along Bainbridge, we jumped in our car and went to Elliott Bay Marina to watch from the little park at the top of the breakwater. The whales were still stretched out for several hundred yards, from Eagle Harbor to as far north as we could see, around Murden Cove and Winslow.

We were handing our binoculars to everyone who walked by. Most of the world was totally unaware of what was happening.

Remarkable. Thanks WSB for the tweet!

d October 12, 2009 (2:48 pm)

That’s why this Puget Sound native never could leave – those pics say it all. Foothills, trees, blue water, beasts…thanks so much for sharing them; but, darn it, as happy as I am to read of others’ excitement, I admit I am a touch jealous of Bill R. and the Argosy passengers. I imagine that would have been a time where the overused phrase “awesome” truly meant something very special, eh?

dufus October 12, 2009 (5:31 pm)

FANTASTIC!!! Wow, what amazing beauty we have in our backyards!

Rose De Dan October 13, 2009 (9:48 am)

It is so wonderful to see the video and photos and to read the experiences, thanks for sharing! I live on Alki but did not get to see them.

People for Puget Sound is one group working to change our local waters to a healthy environment where orcas and other wildlife can continue to play and to prosper. Right now J pod, our local orca pod, is suffering and horrible to think of, may die out. Check out http://www.pugetsound.org