Chicken of the sea
July 22, 2013 2:51 PM Subscribe
That is both terrifying and awesome.
posted by Pecinpah at 3:14 PM on July 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by Pecinpah at 3:14 PM on July 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
Awesome. Terrific. Rorquals are so cool.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 3:15 PM on July 22, 2013
posted by the man of twists and turns at 3:15 PM on July 22, 2013
The whales are all "AAAHH! Who put those nasty things in our food?! I'm writing a bad review on Yelp for this feeding spot!"
posted by rtha at 3:29 PM on July 22, 2013 [9 favorites]
posted by rtha at 3:29 PM on July 22, 2013 [9 favorites]
NOPE × 10^256
posted by Stonestock Relentless at 3:57 PM on July 22, 2013 [2 favorites]
posted by Stonestock Relentless at 3:57 PM on July 22, 2013 [2 favorites]
We have WhaleSign!
posted by Artw at 4:04 PM on July 22, 2013 [4 favorites]
posted by Artw at 4:04 PM on July 22, 2013 [4 favorites]
Its ribs our ceiling beams, its guts our carpeting. . . .
posted by Danf at 4:23 PM on July 22, 2013 [5 favorites]
posted by Danf at 4:23 PM on July 22, 2013 [5 favorites]
Presumably, like dolphins and Killer whales, Humpback whales have sonar that can identify the fat content of human divers, scanned the interlopers, found them to be inedible (and, in any case, far too large for their grapefruit-sized gullet) and nimbly avoided them at the last minute.
posted by KokuRyu at 4:43 PM on July 22, 2013 [2 favorites]
posted by KokuRyu at 4:43 PM on July 22, 2013 [2 favorites]
I am sure the whales were only doing it for scientific purposes.
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:07 PM on July 22, 2013 [8 favorites]
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:07 PM on July 22, 2013 [8 favorites]
Surfer knocked unconscious as 10-metre whale tosses Bondi boarders with its tail
posted by homunculus at 5:16 PM on July 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by homunculus at 5:16 PM on July 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
That SMH article reads like it was written by and written for people who sniff gasoline.
posted by KokuRyu at 5:30 PM on July 22, 2013
posted by KokuRyu at 5:30 PM on July 22, 2013
I dunno. It looked to me like the whale missed the diver by feet. Never since I gained the age of adulthood have I (while sober) tried to take a bite of food and missed by feet. I think the whale knew exactly what it was eating, though it may also have been having the divers on a bit. Fuckin' humans, don't know to stay out of the food...
If you were really hungry, and a tiny alien insisted on sitting in your lunch, are you gonna tell me you wouldn't maybe eat around it?
posted by agentofselection at 5:32 PM on July 22, 2013 [7 favorites]
If you were really hungry, and a tiny alien insisted on sitting in your lunch, are you gonna tell me you wouldn't maybe eat around it?
posted by agentofselection at 5:32 PM on July 22, 2013 [7 favorites]
So the lesson here seems to be to never do any activity that appears remotely adventurous. Okay, I'm convinced!
posted by ThatCanadianGirl at 6:01 PM on July 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by ThatCanadianGirl at 6:01 PM on July 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
Divers Have a Surprise Encounter with a Humpback Whale
posted by homunculus at 6:31 PM on July 22, 2013 [2 favorites]
posted by homunculus at 6:31 PM on July 22, 2013 [2 favorites]
They're like Sand Worms! But not worms. And in water.
posted by sourwookie at 7:24 PM on July 22, 2013 [3 favorites]
posted by sourwookie at 7:24 PM on July 22, 2013 [3 favorites]
That was awesome and terrifying. Is there a word for that other than awesome?
posted by maryr at 8:14 PM on July 22, 2013
posted by maryr at 8:14 PM on July 22, 2013
This better not be a viral video to tease the third new Star Trek film.
posted by humanfont at 8:28 PM on July 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by humanfont at 8:28 PM on July 22, 2013 [1 favorite]
I had my first go on an Oculus Rift a couple of days ago and within minutes I was nonchalantly standing on top of a humpback whale with my head poking out of the water. It seemed legit at the time; are we saying that it was an unrealistic scenario?
posted by jonnyploy at 4:43 AM on July 23, 2013
posted by jonnyploy at 4:43 AM on July 23, 2013
surely this was just the Whaley boys having a go at the divers, no?
posted by namewithoutwords at 4:52 AM on July 23, 2013
posted by namewithoutwords at 4:52 AM on July 23, 2013
Never since I gained the age of adulthood have I (while sober) tried to take a bite of food and missed by feet.
To be fair, those whales are 6-9 times longer than you, so really you should be thinking in terms of inches. I have occasionally had a "shrimp incident" where the gustatory process failed by inches, and those shrimp were not alive at the time.
Besides, who says the whales were sober? I have a close friend who is a Gray Whale, and she says that Humpbacks have quite the reputations as boozers. There may be some inter-whale spite going on, but I wouldn't discount the possibility.
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:45 AM on July 23, 2013 [2 favorites]
To be fair, those whales are 6-9 times longer than you, so really you should be thinking in terms of inches. I have occasionally had a "shrimp incident" where the gustatory process failed by inches, and those shrimp were not alive at the time.
Besides, who says the whales were sober? I have a close friend who is a Gray Whale, and she says that Humpbacks have quite the reputations as boozers. There may be some inter-whale spite going on, but I wouldn't discount the possibility.
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:45 AM on July 23, 2013 [2 favorites]
Doesn't look like they were able to place any Maker hooks.
posted by Kabanos at 7:13 AM on July 23, 2013
posted by Kabanos at 7:13 AM on July 23, 2013
That SMH article reads like it was written by and written for people who sniff gasoline.
posted by KokuRyu at 8:30 PM
Yeah, and it's about damn chair.
posted by orme at 7:44 AM on July 23, 2013
posted by KokuRyu at 8:30 PM
Yeah, and it's about damn chair.
posted by orme at 7:44 AM on July 23, 2013
From the title I was expecting tuna.
posted by jlh at 8:12 AM on July 23, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by jlh at 8:12 AM on July 23, 2013 [1 favorite]
Here's another video showing almost the exact same thing, again without a person ending up tucked in a corner of a whale's mouth. This leads me to believe that humpback whales are doing this on purpose and are the jerks of the cetacean world.
posted by Panjandrum at 8:31 AM on July 23, 2013 [3 favorites]
posted by Panjandrum at 8:31 AM on July 23, 2013 [3 favorites]
This leads me to believe that humpback whales are doing this on purpose and are the jerks of the cetacean world.
Hey, maybe we are tasty! Becoming tasty has been a poor survival strategy for most animals, but it's not like we listen to the other animals anyway.
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:03 AM on July 23, 2013
Hey, maybe we are tasty! Becoming tasty has been a poor survival strategy for most animals, but it's not like we listen to the other animals anyway.
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:03 AM on July 23, 2013
So the Marine Mammal Protection Act that proscribes a 100 yard distance between humans and whales didn't apply to these folks somehow...?
I sincerely hope they didn't bait those waters themselves.
posted by jesourie at 12:47 PM on July 23, 2013
I sincerely hope they didn't bait those waters themselves.
posted by jesourie at 12:47 PM on July 23, 2013
It doesn't apply if they approach you (it's hard as hell to give a ticket to a whale, let along getting them to show up for court). We were on a whale watching tour a while back and three humpbacks came right up to the boat (the motor was off at that point) and looked at all of us on it. We did not approach them; they came to us.
(I can't even imagine how you would go about baiting that many live baitfish. Easier to find a school and wait for the whales to come to you.)
posted by rtha at 1:54 PM on July 23, 2013 [3 favorites]
(I can't even imagine how you would go about baiting that many live baitfish. Easier to find a school and wait for the whales to come to you.)
posted by rtha at 1:54 PM on July 23, 2013 [3 favorites]
jesourie:"Um, yeah, so we'd like to order about 6,000 pounds of fish... all the same species. What? On ice? No! Live fish, duh.... Hello?"
I sincerely hope they didn't bait those waters themselves.
posted by IAmBroom at 10:10 AM on July 25, 2013 [1 favorite]
I sincerely hope they didn't bait those waters themselves.
It's a bait ball (awesome video). The Planet Earth series on discovery also has some awesome footage of bait balls.
We live close to the ocean, and often see bait balls about half a kilometer off shore, and I speculate with my son what predator is pushing the fish to the surface... porpoises? Stellar sea lions? Chinook salmon?
In the original video above, you'll notice at the far left of the scene there are some California seal lions (you can hear them calling, too). And there are whales at the top of the screen about a football-field (100 meters) away from the dive boat.
posted by KokuRyu at 10:13 AM on July 25, 2013 [1 favorite]
It's a bait ball (awesome video). The Planet Earth series on discovery also has some awesome footage of bait balls.
We live close to the ocean, and often see bait balls about half a kilometer off shore, and I speculate with my son what predator is pushing the fish to the surface... porpoises? Stellar sea lions? Chinook salmon?
In the original video above, you'll notice at the far left of the scene there are some California seal lions (you can hear them calling, too). And there are whales at the top of the screen about a football-field (100 meters) away from the dive boat.
posted by KokuRyu at 10:13 AM on July 25, 2013 [1 favorite]
Yep, as I suspected, that's very close to where I live (5 miles). The major news reports got the location of the incident wrong... the divers were from Morro Bay (about 12 miles from me as the crow flies, almost 20 by road) but it happened off Avila Beach, where close (but not THAT close) encounters with whales happen often.
posted by oneswellfoop at 10:54 AM on July 25, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by oneswellfoop at 10:54 AM on July 25, 2013 [1 favorite]
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Lesson when you're in the water....when the baitfish are jumping like that, there's generally a reason swimming nearby under the surface.
posted by nevercalm at 2:55 PM on July 22, 2013 [3 favorites]