For the first time in months, a pod of killer whales was spotted in Southern California.
Whale-watching tour operators in Long Beach and Newport Beach shared footage of a pod of five Eastern Tropical Pacific orcas that migrated up the coast from Mexico and were spotted in the waters off Orange County and Los Angeles County with KTLA.
Drone footage recorded Monday by Mauricio Tassara (IG: @empty_drone) was shared with KTLA by Harbor Breeze Cruises. The whales appear to be feasting on stingrays, and we catch a rare glimpse of a white killer whale calf named Frosty.
The video was taken Monday around noon as the tour began in Long Beach, capturing the killer whales in the area for the first time since earlier in the year.
“This is the first time since late January we have seen these amazing whales off the coast during one of our tours and the fourteenth time total since December,” said Harbor Breeze C.O.O. Jeff Forney. “The Orcas put on a wonderful show for the passengers.”
The orcas were spotted a little further down the coast in Newport a short while later. A tour group with Newport Coastal Adventure was out on the water and a video of the killer whales close by the boat.
On several occasions over the past month, the killer whales have been spotted by whale-watching tours in San Diego and were assumed to be headed home to Mexico, only to swim back north again.
While they are often called “killer whales,” orcas are not whales but rather the largest member of the dolphin family. The Eastern Tropical Pacific, or ETP, orcas’ choice of prey, being fellow dolphins and whales, makes them unique from other ecotypes sometimes spotted along SoCal’s coast.
ETPs were last seen in California in 2021 and, before that, in 2018, according to experts.
For tours: Harbor Breeze (Long Beach), Newport Landing (Newport Beach)