Keiko Part 3 with Brianna Bowman

Summary

You're Wrong About: Keiko Part 3 with Brianna Bowman (Feb 17, 2026)

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Episode Overview

In this final installment of the Keiko trilogy, host Sarah Marshall and whale researcher Brianna Bowman retrace the troubled, touching, and often contentious journey of Keiko—better known as the orca star of "Free Willy"—as activists and scientists attempted to "rewild" him after years of captivity. This episode explores the difficulties, debates, hopes, and heartbreaks of Keiko’s release and final years, pondering what it means to help wild creatures reclaim lost freedom—and what happens when reality falls short of the storybook ending.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Challenges of Rewilding Keiko

• Physical Conditioning & Health

  • Keiko had lived in captivity from age two, meaning he had minimal experience swimming long distances as wild whales do [00:45–01:24].
  • Intensive efforts were made to build his stamina, which was an "unprecedented" challenge according to Brianna:

    "It's like you taking me, who... is within like a 12 foot radius of my couch most days and be like, Sarah, you're gonna walk the Pacific Crest Trail, and then you're just gonna keep doing it for the rest of your life." – Sarah [01:09]

• Learning to Hunt and Feed

  • Keiko struggled (often unconvincingly) to eat live fish; he mostly accepted stunned fish, not vibrant, active ones [03:15–03:35].
  • Differing philosophies divided the team: some felt hunting was key, others (like Mark Simmons) prioritized social integration, believing that if Keiko joined wild pods, hunting skills would follow [04:15–06:11]:

    "If he was able to integrate with other whales, then he would be able to learn from them how to hunt... at the very least, they could help feed him somehow." – Brianna re: Mark Simmons [04:35]

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Human Disagreements: Philosophy & Management

• Integration vs. Self-Sufficiency

  • Some experts believed whale integration was paramount, but others doubted it could be taught or managed by humans [06:11–07:15].
  • Debate over whether isolation-fostered dependency could be reversed, or if social skills would "naturally" re-emerge [07:03–07:23]:

    "I would not necessarily have confidence that he could figure it out... it's not like we've seen a whale do that before, right?" – Sarah [07:16]

• Conflicting Human Personalities

  • Divergent leadership styles—the laissez-faire “just cut the net” approach of Dr. Lanny Cornell versus more gradual, incremental methods favored by Simmons and Friday—created persistent divisions [09:44–11:20].
  • Cornell’s attitude considered too abrupt for the personality Keiko had become:

    "If they had immediately put him in a bay, I think he would have just hung out in the bay. Like, I don't think he would have gone anywhere." – Brianna [11:35]

• Conflicting Stakeholder Interests

  • As Keiko moved into larger sea pens and eventually the open ocean (spring 2000), public and donor expectations often clashed with practical or scientific caution [12:35–14:15].
  • "Ocean walks" (boat-led exercises) were a compromise between full release and protection against risks like construction noise and lack of orientation [14:16–16:19].

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The Dream and Its Limits

• Wishful Thinking vs. Reality

  • Many involved believed humans could "undo" captivity—a hope Brianna and Sarah call into question:

    “There needs to be room at the table for the question of, if we can't undo what we've done, what else can we do?” – Sarah [16:18]

  • Personal stories (comparing to home pets who don’t stray) illuminate Keiko's attachment to humans and routine—even when given more freedom, he often gravitated back to familiarity [16:32–17:23].

• First Encounter with Wild Whales

  • Team divisions manifest in a tense, over-documented first introduction to wild orcas (June 2000) [23:07–25:15].
  • Contrary to expectations, the event overwhelms Keiko—he and the wild pod “surprised each other,” and Keiko flees in confusion:

    “Keiko was waiting for instruction… he plunged explosively into the depths, and this other whale did too.” – Brianna via Mark Simmons [27:53]

  • Conflicting interpretations: some believe he was "going free," others see distress—a pattern echoing the unresolvable nature of projecting human intent onto animal action [29:29–31:30].

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Team Fallout and Project Fraying

• Resignation and “Narrative Fray”

  • Principal trainers Simmons and Friday resign after the board declines to cede operational control, feeling their expertise is discounted by donor-driven spectacle [33:24–34:48].
  • Sarah reflects on the limits of novice optimism in complex endeavors:

    “The more you know, generally in any project... the less convinced you become that the specific goal... is achievable.” – Sarah [34:54]

• Reflection on Scientific Process

  • The hosts muse on public misconceptions about science as “facts” vs. as a process of humility, iteration, and continual reappraisal [37:33–41:19]:

    “Science is an action… It should be a verb, right?” – Brianna [40:13]

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The Ending: Legacy and Lessons

• Funding Dries Up, Staff Depart

  • As funders withdraw and staff shrink, the project shifts from hope of rewilding to ongoing caretaking near Norway [44:28–46:45].
  • Efforts to wean Keiko off human provisioning have mixed results—he continues to prefer human company [46:45–48:53].

• Keiko’s Final Swim

  • In July 2002, separated during a storm, Keiko travels east alone for three weeks, ultimately arriving in a Norwegian fjord—where he immediately finds a family and becomes the village’s gentle, playful celebrity [49:21–53:55].
  • Iconic footage: Norwegian children riding on Keiko’s back, a powerful symbol of both his sociability and dependency [54:01–55:23].

• Can You Reverse Socialization?

  • The team concludes that, despite all efforts, Keiko’s formative years cemented his affinity for humans, not whales. The analogy to the linguistics “Genie experiment” underscores the permanence of critical period effects [57:03–58:37].

• Keiko’s Final Years & Death

  • After his move to Norway, Keiko lives another year and a half; with pared-down staff and limited resources, his recurring respiratory infection advances. He dies in December 2003 at age 27 [67:04–69:25].

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Rewilding’s Limits:

  “We really did put a whale back in the ocean and back in his home. And I can't understate how important that is in terms of understanding how we can… try to put the world back the way we found it. And maybe we learned that we can't totally do that, but we can get really close…” – Brianna [71:30]

• On Science as Process:

  “Science is a process… we need a verb because I think science is an action.” – Brianna [40:13]

• On Wishful Thinking:

  “There are projects people take on with great confidence because they don’t understand how hard the different elements of it are going to be…” – Sarah [35:00]

• On Keiko finding kids in Norway:

  “There is incredible footage and pictures of kids... riding on Keiko’s back.” – Brianna [53:17]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [00:42–03:15]: Keiko’s physical training & challenges with live prey
• [06:11–08:13]: Camp debate over social integration vs. self-sufficiency
• [09:44–11:20]: Contrasting leadership philosophies (Cornell vs. Simmons/Friday)
• [14:15–16:19]: Keiko’s ocean walks and release obstacles
• [23:07–27:26]: The “low key” first wild encounter debacle
• [29:29–31:30]: Contradictions in interpreting animal behavior
• [33:24–34:48]: Staff resignations & “narrative fraying”
• [37:33–41:19]: Science, iterating, and the nature of inquiry
• [49:21–55:23]: Keiko's arrival in Norway and village children interactions
• [67:04–69:25]: Keiko’s illness and death

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Final Reflection and Legacy

• The “Messy Ending”
  • Despite not achieving the “swim off into the sunset” dream, the project yielded hard-won knowledge about the limits and responsibilities of animal rescue.
  • Keiko’s story now informs initiatives like the Whale Sanctuary Project, seeking to provide humane oceanic retirements for former captive cetaceans:

    “Full reintroduction into the wild may not be realistic, but we can still provide a good life for these animals…” – Brianna [73:28]

  • Keiko’s journey—full of optimism, conflict, heartbreak, and discovery—remains, above all, a testament to human care and the deep complexity of trying to right past wrongs for other species.

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For listeners moved by Keiko’s tale, Brianna invites memories and support for her ongoing “Rewilding Keiko” podcast project ([e-mail]) [75:24].

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Tone & Style Note:
The episode blends humor (“It's a hell of a day at sea...”), deep emotionality, and open-ended inquiry, mirroring Keiko’s ambiguous but impactful story.

Transcript

[A]

It's a hell of a day at sea. To quote the movie Overboard, Welcome to Yo Wrong about this is the grand finale of our Keiko trilogy with Brianna Bowman, and we cannot wait to share it with you. We have a bonus episode out now about Ishtar, the worst movie ever made. Or is it with Paul Scheer and Amy Nicholson of the unspooled podcast? And that's about it. Let's go hang out with that whale.

[B]

So Keiko's the dancing queen.

[A]

Yep, he really is.

[B]

They were working on his physical health, on, you know, improving his stamina. Cause as I've mentioned a few times, wild whales swim tens, if not hundreds of miles a day, so they need. He needed to work on that. Oh, break.

[A]

And he doesn't know how to do that.

[B]

Yeah, he's never done that.

[A]

Oh, no.

[B]

Except when he was like 2. But, yeah, he hasn't done that. So he's gotta. Yeah, he's gotta work on his health.

[A]

I mean, it's like you taking me, who, like, is, you know, within like a 12 foot radius of my couch most days and be like, sarah, you're gonna walk the Pacific Crest Trail, and then you're just gonna keep doing it for the rest of your life. Cause that's what you do.

[B]

Yep. Yeah, that's a very good analogy. Yeah. He's been in a tank since he was 2 years old. He hasn't gone further than really a few feet for his whole life. And so this is. It is quite a big undertaking to improve his physical stamina at this point. So they were working on that.

[A]

And again, apparently, basically unprecedented, you know, because, like, you've been researching this for years. If there was some, like, major obvious precedent, you would know about it, I really think.

[B]

Yeah, I would. I would think I would know.

[A]

I'm sure there's things that, like, kind of apply, but like, yeah, this thing of, like, it feels like, can it be done the way we're envisioning it is like a very major question. This whole time.

[B]

Yes, absolutely. And then the other big thing, and this started in Oregon, was training Keiko to eat live fish. Both. Well, Kenneth Brower, you know, he's an author. He wasn't directly involved with the project, but he would dip in and out and met Keiko in person a few times and saw how the project was going. And even he said, I'm sorry, the.

[A]

Phrasing is just so great. Cause it's like, I don't know, it makes me think of other celebrity memoirs. And it's like, yes. They had three meetings at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Like, it's like Nancy Reagan or something. Thing.

[B]

Yeah, Yeah. I. I like the idea of Kenneth Brower sitting by the side of Keiko's tank and, like, holding up a microphone.

[A]

Yes, exactly.

[B]

Oh. But he even. He said, like, when he went to the Oregon Coast Aquarium and supposedly Keiko was kind of eating live fish, then Brower said he wasn't too impressed with what he saw. And it was mostly that Keiko wouldn't eat a really vibrant, alive fish. They would usually have to stun it first. And so he would eat a fish.

[A]

That had been really depressed for a long time. Yeah.

[B]

You know, that was, like, moving a lot slower and. Yeah. Had been, like, kind of smacked on the head or something. And so, yeah, I think he would kind of, like, mouth them. Like, he wouldn't really eat them, but then sometimes he would, and people would be like, oh, my gosh, he's eating live fish. But it wasn't very convincing to a.

[A]

Few people, or I guess, like, maybe not super consistent behavior. Like, it's like, I could eat a bell pepper maybe on a whim one day, but, like, I hate them. I'm not going to start eating them all the time.

[B]

Yeah. And if something was, like, dependent on you eating a bell pepper.

[A]

Right. If everyone was staring at me and they were clearly going to be really happy if I ate that bell pepper, like, I'd do it, but I'd be like, all right, you enjoy that. I'm not doing that tomorrow. That was weird.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah. It would take time.

[A]

Again, not that we know what he was thinking, but the consistency of him, like, seeming to not pick up that behavior is interesting.

[B]

Right. Yeah. You know, and they worked on this at the Oregon Coast Aquarium, and then they worked on it more in Iceland. But there seemed to be some people that were really excited by Keiko demonstrating, yes, he's eating live fish. But then there are other people, and notably Mark Simmons. He writes a few times in his book that he wasn't very convinced by Keiko's enthusiasm for eating live fish and being able to feed himself, because that was such a big. That was like. One of the main questions that persisted throughout the project was whether Keiko was eating live fish and whether he was hunting or showing the capability of being able to hunt and feed himself. And Mark made an interesting point. He felt that it was actually. Actually less important to emphasize whether or not he was able to feed himself, because he felt that what was more important for Keiko's survival was his ability to integrate with other whales. And if he was able to integrate with other whales, then he would be able to learn from them how to hunt or, you know, at the very least, they could help feed him somehow. You know, in. When wild whales, like whales in Iceland, if they go after a school of herring, a lot of the time they're. I believe the Icelandic whales kind of use this tactic of smacking their tail through a herring school. So they just stun a bunch of fish at once, and then they swim back and able to just eat the stunned fish. Which is kind of funny when you think about it. Cause that's actually what Keiko wants to eat, is stunned fish. So I never really thought about that.

[A]

Just got there a different way. He's like, this is the goal. I already have it.

[B]

Yeah. So even if he didn't know how to do that, he would maybe be able to, like, pick up little scraps here and there or something like that.

[A]

But, yeah.

[B]

So Mark Simmons and I believe Robin Friday as well, they felt that it was much more important for Keiko to integrate with wild whales. Other people didn't seem to think that was, like, as important or just didn't prioritize it.

[A]

Which is interesting, because I would say again, knowing nothing, I would say that learning how to integrate with other whales does seem like the most important to me. Because as a social animal, as a species who kind of doesn't have a choice but to be social generally, it seems like, with some rare exceptions, that if he can't integrate with other whales, then that would be really bad.

[B]

Right. It's not that other people thought that he didn't need to integrate with wild whales. I think it was more that they felt that that wasn't something that would need to be taught or need to.

[A]

Be guided by people, that it would.

[B]

Be something that Keiko would figure out.

[A]

I mean, I guess it would be convenient to come to that conclusion, because how would they teach it if they decided to do it?

[B]

Well, exactly.

[A]

But also, I would not necessarily have confidence that he could figure it out.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because it's not like we've seen a whale do that before, right?

[B]

Yeah. There's a lot of, like, these really unknown paths of how on earth are we going to get to this goal?

[A]

Right. Because also, how often do pods of whales, like, adopt solo whales? Is a relevant question. Is that a behavior that they have? Or would they be like, who the fuck are you?

[B]

I'm not aware of a pod adopting another whale. There are instances of, like, killer whales coming together as large groups. I'm thinking of Southern resident killer whales. There's JK Nail pod. And they, for the most part, you know, don't interact with. With each other. But then you'll have these superpod events.

[A]

They have jamborees, and they come together.

[B]

And they hunt and socialize. There was actually a superpod event back in, like, November, I believe.

[A]

Super pod.

[B]

So in that environment. Super pod. In that environment, you could possibly have individuals that, like, don't know each other that well, interacting with each other. But I'm talking about these super pods specifically because that was seen as a possible route of, like, how to introduce Keiko. And I'm kind of like imagining a situation where he's like a wedding crasher. It's just like everybody assumes he's a part of somebody else's family and they're like, I don't know, he's cool, whatever. Anyway, so there's these different attitudes, and then I'll say two. A person that I've mentioned a few times is Dr. Lanny Cornell. He was a veterinarian. He was specifically a killer whale veterinarian at SeaWorld, I believe he was currently, at the time of the story, still working at SeaWorld as a veterinarian. He is often described as a kind of challenging personality to work with. And Mark Simmons definitely had his own opinions that he is very explicit about in his book about Dr. Lanny Cornell. Obviously, he had extensive experience working in this field. Very few people. Again, going back to, like, how many people have direct experience with killer whales and then how many veterinarians have direct experience with killer whales? Like, not very many. So he was the right person to be involved with this. But he, from what I can tell, has a very strong personality. And he had a tendency to rub people the wrong way. And he was a very strong voice in what he thought were the correct ways to go about with the release side of the project, which, if you think about it, he's a veterinarian. It's not to say he doesn't have experience with killer whales, but he has it in a very particular setting and with very particular goals and outcomes in mind that are really different than the question of how do you release a wild whale. But he had his own opinions and his approach, from what I can gather, he strikes me as a guy that would think, like, the best way to teach a dog to swim is just to just throw them in a pool. Is like, they'll just figure it out. Like, you just throw them in. And I've met. I Have met people like this. Like, oh, yeah, you just.

[A]

God, I thought you were exaggerating for comic effect. Yeah, no, I.

[B]

Like, I have.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I don't interact with these people anymore. But they just think, like, yeah, if you want to teach a dog to swim, just, like, throw them in and they'll figure it out. And it's like, yeah, or else. Or you might actually just severely traumatize an animal.

[A]

Right. They can just be. Yeah, they can be scared of water for the rest of their. That could be good. Yeah, just, like, get a kiddie pool and chill out in there to begin with.

[B]

Right. So anyway, Lanny Cornell, I believe from a few different sources I've read, his attitude about releasing Keiko was to just cut the net open and let him go and just see what happens.

[A]

No handouts. When I was a young whale, that's what I did, and I liked it.

[B]

Yeah, I think that was his attitude. I find it funny because in reading about Keiko and how things went, I think if they had immediately put him in a bay, I think he would have just hung out in the bay. Like, I don't think he would have gone anywhere.

[A]

Yeah, I was wondering that earlier. I feel. Yeah, he probably would have just, like, hung out where the people and the food was.

[B]

Yeah, maybe he. You know, he would have wandered off. But I do think, well, we'll see that Keiko does tend to gravitate towards people. So that approach just seemed a little bit not realistic or really what was appropriate for Keiko. And so anyway, Lanny Cornell had this attitude. Mark Simmons and Robin Friday had a much different attitude. And then there were people that were kind of somewhere in between. So there was a lot of people with really strong feelings about what was best for Keiko, and they were kind of at odds with each other. And I believe this kind of contributes to the kind of fraying of the narrative thread at the end of the Keiko story.

[A]

Okay, and when is that? Where in time are we at this point?

[B]

So he went to Iceland in 1998. In September 1998, they arrive in Iceland. It's immediately winter. It takes a while for them to kind of get their bearings with this new stage of the project and everything. Keiko's in his sea pen. They're doing some training with him. All this, like, interpersonal nonsense is happening above the water. Keiko's just chilling out below the water, but they're making forward steps in the project. It's just a matter of, like, with every step forward, there's just this sense of for some people. And when I say step forward, I mean, like, going, like Keiko going from being in the sea pen to then being in the larger Klutzwig Bay. So they actually were able to wall off part of the bay with a net. So we went from a little sea pen about, like, I want to say, maybe it was like half a football field or something like that. So it was a little contained area to having this wide open bay that was still closed off, but certainly the largest area Keiko's been able to swim in since he was little. And there's a lot of attention with each step of, like, oh, my gosh, he's getting this much closer to being out in the wild. And we got to have a lot of media involved and a lot of people documenting it. And the big next step that took place was going out of Klutsvik Bay and into the open ocean for the first time.

[A]

Oh, boy.

[B]

And the main reason that that happened when it did, which I want to say that was in, like, spring of 2000, I believe that step of the story happened when Keiko finally went out into the open ocean, mostly because there was construction happening in the harbor and there was going to be explosives going off, there was going to be pile drivings. So they were worried about Keiko's hearing. Hearing is really essential for whales. This is a conservation issue around the world with marine noise and traffic and all that interfering with their ability to hear, which for an animal that uses sound to get around, it's pretty devastating to not be able to hear anymore. So they wanted to protect Keiko's hearing. They're like, oh, crap. Okay, well, I guess we gotta push this permitting process through quicker. That was the thing that was kind of slowing things up was they hadn't gotten the permits to actually release Keiko, but they reached a compromise with fisheries people and they were able to take Keiko out into the open ocean. They took him around the corner, which would kind of protect him from some of the sound. And that was successful as well. But there was even at that stage where Keiko had been trained at that point to follow another boat. They called it a walk boat and they called him taking him out to the ocean, his ocean walks. So, like walking your dog. He was trained to follow this boat, the Draupnir. And even with that, there were a few people that were not just hoping, I think, but expecting Keiko to just take off, which, I don't know, I guess, yeah, that was possible, but also just seemed kind of improbable. Just knowing Keiko as an individual.

[A]

Right. And it feels like there's this sort of, like, this wishful thinking at play that humans have the ability to completely undo what humans have done to an animal.

[B]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

You know, that we made him captive, and now we can make him uncaptive. And it feels like, you know. Yeah. That, like, there needs to be room at the table for the question of, if we can't undo what we've done, what else can we do?

[B]

I actually like thinking about Murphy earlier. I was like, maybe, actually, Murphy and Keiko's personalities were really similar.

[A]

I think so.

[B]

Murphy's a sensitive soul and very sweet and loves people.

[A]

And you wouldn't want to have Murphy try and go live in the forest.

[B]

No, actually, this is specifically the thing I thought of was one time the gate to the backyard got left open. And, you know, some dogs. Again, like, speaking about individuals, some dogs.

[A]

Will just end up in another town if you do that.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But Murphy. Murphy just went and sat by the front door. Like, she went out and was like.

[A]

She was like, I did all my homework already.

[B]

Yeah. And she just sat by the front door.

[A]

She was like, mother, you left the gate open.

[B]

So I feel like a Keiko is actually very similar. There are stories about how even in the bay, you can imagine it's like concentric circles. So there's the sea pen, the small place he started at. Then there's the big bay that he had access to after a certain amount of time. And then he would go out of the bay with his people on ocean walks. But even when he was, like, in the bay and he had access to the whole bay, sometimes he would go back to his sea pen and just, like, hang out there. It was like his. I don't know, like the equivalent of a kennel. But, yeah, so he's going out on these walks. And part of the permitting process, too, he had to have two tags attached to him. So you mentioned that earlier, that, like, part of being able to determine whether he's successfully released or not, we would need to be able to track him and make sure he's okay afterwards. So he had a. He had a VHF tag and a satellite tag. So the satellite tag would give his position from anywhere. But this being, you know, in the late 90s or actually 2000, the satellite tag would only give a position once a day. And I think he would have to be at the surface, I believe, to be able to, like, transmit to a satellite. So they would only be able to get a position Once. So if you're trying to really hone in on where Keiko is, specifically, the satellite tag would give you the general area. But then to get him more dialed in on where he is, you'd use the VHF tag. So the VHF tag, that would transmit a signal over a radio wave, essentially, that was a line of sight, so you might not be able to physically see Keiko. He might be pretty far off and, you know, behind a wave or something like that. But the person holding a piece of equipment that would receive the signal from his VHF tag, they would, like, scan their horizon with it, and if it was lined up with Keiko's tag, it would beep. So they could be like, oh, he's in that direction. And that's how they could, like, hone in on where he was if he wandered off. So these tags were a condition of his release as well. But they got that all figured out for that first time out when he was. When they were trying to avoid construction. And then shortly after that, they got the full permits to actually take Keiko out and start introducing him to wild whales. And I have to say, like, even this step of him going out into the wild ocean is really incredible. Like, I mean, every step of this story is amazing, and I really admire the people that, like, really put their heart and soul into getting this whale to this point. Yeah.

[A]

And I don't want to come across as too critical about it, for my part, because I really don't know anything. And it is amazing, and especially the degree of dedication happening here.

[B]

It is. And to think, like, Keiko was now swimming in an environment without walls and without borders and in water that, you know, he hadn't been in since he was little, like, since he was 2 years old, and hearing things that he hadn't heard in 20 years. And, you know, the. I guess the. Even, like, even being in the bay, like, he. The first day he was there, there was, like, a harbor porpoise that swam by, and apparently they were vocalizing at each other. Like, that's really incredible. And. And the fact that he got to swim for, you know, miles and miles instead of just in a circle in a tank, like, it's really all really wonderful, and it makes me a little emotional thinking about it.

[A]

How dare you?

[B]

I know. I just think it's such a beautiful thing that we did for one creature.

[A]

And it just goes to show how much we can do for creatures sometimes.

[B]

Right. How much we can do for the natural world for of which we are a part. Yeah. Yes, exactly. We have the potential to address these issues. It's just. It's a matter of. It's a matter of money a lot of the time, but it's also just. It is a matter of will, like, really getting people behind. A singular goal and message.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And the beautiful thing about the Keiko project, like, there was a lot of criticism throughout the project of, like, just how much money was being spent and resources being used on one whale when it could have been used on that money, could have maybe been many smaller fish. Yeah. Or even just whales as a whole, you know, across the world. You know, it's that issue that David Phillips brought up of, like, he wanted to help the larger population of whales, but people love what they know and they felt like they knew Keiko and they wanted to. To help him.

[A]

Yeah, we love what we know and we love what we love. To quote the Last Unicorn.

[B]

Oh, yeah. But, yeah, it's just. It is incredible what we can accomplish. And Keiko, I mean, he was just one really. He was just a very lucky whale that he got to, even to this point of just being able to swim in the open ocean that where he was born is really pretty spectacular.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But so he had his first encounter with wild whales in June 2000. And like I explained before, Mark Simmons and Robin Friday, they wanted this to be a low key event, which makes sense to me.

[A]

Like, you're just being real chill about taking your indoor kid to the mall, you know.

[B]

Yeah. Like, Keigo has not encountered another orca since, you know, since he was in Canada all those years ago. And also something I thought about, that I didn't see pointed out was that the last time he was around orcas, he was bullied. So, you know, this introduction was going to have to happen pretty carefully. The other people involved, the leadership and the donors and the media all saw this as Keiko's going to find his family and he's going to swim off into the sunset, and we just need to let him do that. And because it was seen as like, oh my gosh, this could be it. This could be the moment that he leaves. There was like a bunch of people that wanted to document the whole thing. There was, I think, two boats that were just full of VIPs and, like, you know, mostly like donors for the project. And then there was two additional boats, one with Mark Simmons and Robin Friday and a few, a couple others, like, on the training side of things, and then another one with Dr. Lanny Cornell and then a researcher, a whale researcher, and another couple of staff And Mark Simmons says what happened was, oh, in addition to these four boats, there's also a helicopter. So it's already, like, not low key.

[A]

It's a hell of a day at sea. To quote the movie Overboard.

[B]

Yeah. There's just a lot going on. Mark Simmons describes that they wanted to do this in a very specific way where they would stop Keiko kind of near the whales and kind of let the wild whales pass by. And if they interacted, great. If they didn't, whatever, you know, the goal was just to have a positive interaction.

[A]

Like, he's a reactive dog at the dog park.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. Like, you just. You got to go about it with little baby steps.

[A]

Yeah. Which I agree with for most things in life.

[B]

Yeah. I think it made sense, especially for the initial interaction. So what it sounded like was that Lanny Cornell and the other people on one boat, they spotted wild whales and were essentially guiding them, I guess, towards Caico. And the researcher on that boat was also trying to collect genetic samples from the whales, which involves a tool that is used by many whale researchers. It's a crossbow, essentially. And you're to get a. Yeah, it's.

[A]

I wasn't expecting that.

[B]

But that's how you get a genetic sample from a whale.

[A]

So do you, like, crossbow in a big syringe and then you, like, yank it out and you're like, thank you.

[B]

Kind of not a syringe. It gets, like, a little just, like, tissue sample from the whale.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And it is what whale researchers use to get this kind of information. And I can see where the researcher was like, yeah, if we have this information, then we can, like, figure out if these whales are related to Keiko, and that would help us.

[A]

Okay, I see.

[B]

You know, like, I get it, but also, I totally understand Mark Simmons frustration in that you are, I don't want to say harassing the whales, but you're not exactly, like, creating a calm environment.

[A]

Yeah, exactly.

[B]

And it's like a couple of mothers and calves and a bull whale, I think. And, like, that wasn't ideal either, because, like, mothers and calves don't really love having a stranger around.

[A]

Yeah. And again, like, I don't ever want to question the dedication of this, but, like, yeah, nobody knows how to do any of this.

[B]

Right? Yeah, everyone's. Everyone's figuring it out.

[A]

And that's fair of the mothers and calves. Yeah.

[B]

Yeah. So they kind of guide these whales towards Keiko in a manner that was not really what had been planned in advance. And from what it sounded like from Simmons account, Keiko had no idea that these whales were coming. And the whales had no idea that Keiko was there, because what were they gonna do?

[A]

Take him aside, be like, hey, Keiko. Right? Today's gonna be kind of a big day because we're gonna try. Oh, you don't know what I'm saying.

[B]

I know. If only. If only we could have explained it to him. But, you know, I think. I mean, the idea was just to have him in the vicinity, and then he would, like, hear them vocalizing and just, like, from a distance, be like, oh, what's that?

[A]

And then, like in the movie, he would just kind of run right on over there. Yeah, because. Yeah, that would be nice.

[B]

But apparently what happened was Keiko and the wild whales surprised each other. And how Simmons describes it as. He was right there. He was like, what with Keiko? He was, like, staring at him like Keiko was waiting for instruction from Mark Simmons. And he said that Keiko plunged explosively into the depths, and this other whale did, too. And they don't know what happened under the water, but for a few minutes, there was nothing. And then this group of whales, they spotted a few hundred feet away. They were taking off in a different direction, but they couldn't find Keiko for a little bit. Eventually, they did find him, but he was taking off in a different direction. And some people interpreted this as, oh, Keiko's going free. He's going. He wants to go and be free. He's leaving. We should just leave him and let him do his thing. Mark and Robin, they did not see it that way. They saw it as a scared animal.

[A]

So he was, like, booking it by his standards.

[B]

Yeah, I think he was booking it. And then the helicopter spotted him, and apparently he would, like, swim a little bit, and then he would, like, swim in a circle, and then he would swim a little more, and then he'd swim in a circle. It kind of reminds me of, like, Dory in Finding Nemo at the end, where she's like, oh, oh. And, like, again, I don't know what Keiko was thinking, but that's what it made me think of.

[A]

No, we don't know, but it does feel a bit overly optimistic maybe, to be like, wow, Keiko had one interaction with a whale briefly for the first time in 20 years, and then he thought to himself, gee, fuck all these people. I'm leaving. I'm going to go in the opposite direction of everyone and be free on my own.

[B]

Right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And so Robin and Mark and then a couple of the other people Involved. They actually went to find Keiko, and a few people on the other side of the project were saying, like, don't go after him. You're supposed to leave him be. And they're like, no, he's not doing well. He's still in our care. Like, we still need to take care of him.

[A]

I mean, it makes sense. No one can agree on what human children need, and we've raised billions of them.

[B]

Oh, absolutely. Actually, even Kenneth Brower in his book, you know, he inserts his own opinion often in the book, and he expressed that he felt like some of the trainers that were involved with the project were kind of like a overly doting mother that can't let go of their child's hand. Or. You know, I think he described it as like a mom showing up at their son's college dorm room ready to clean their room for them. Like, he just. He thought the trainers were just a little too attached to Keiko and were reticent to let him go.

[A]

Yeah. But arguably, by the same token, that does feel like a kind of attachment to sort of be. Maybe not attachment exactly, but to be invested in a certain outcome and in the idea that that is definitely what the animal. Because there's, like, intent implied by the idea of, like, oh, he's swimming away, he's being free. It's like there's some kind of a belief that you're interpreting an animal's emotional state in a way where it doesn't seem like you have enough data to say that necessarily.

[B]

I mean, that's very true, and I agree with that. But I guess you can make the argument that that's exactly what the trainers were doing, too. They were argu. Well, I guess really it's that everyone.

[A]

Including me right now, is doing that. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

It's just. It's a. It's a hard situation.

[A]

That's the beauty of the beast. Yeah.

[B]

Yeah. So anyway, they go and retrieve Keiko, and, you know, he seems to them really distressed. And the other part of the team, they're ready to, like, bring him back out with more whales. And Robin and Mark are like, no, like, Keiko, he's, like, tired. He can't. He can't keep up with us. He's exhausted. He seems totally wigged out and stressed. He just needs to recuperate a little bit. So when Robin and Mark get back to the headquarters back in the bay, they have a conversation with the project manager, a man named Charles Vinick, and Robin and Mark are basically like, look, this was not how we Wanted it to go. This is not how we believe as experts in our field that we should be introducing Keiko. This needs to be a calm, iterative process. It's going to take months, if not years to accomplish. This is not a one and done thing. And we have like these demands, one of them being that the next time we do this, only like a maximum of two boats can come out. We can't take out everybody who has enough money to pay for it. Like we just. This has to be just about Keiko and the whales and their new hit single, Keiko and the Whales. But. And Charles would kind of relay this to the board and apparently was like going back and forth between like hotel rooms, like being the messenger. And there was a couple other people that were on Robin and Mark's side of it. But at the end of this discussion, the board did not want to concede to what Robin and Mark wanted to do. And so they ended up resigning from the project right then and there.

[A]

Oh yeah, that's interesting. I didn't expect that.

[B]

Yeah, they were really, really unhappy. And I guess I can't, I don't have enough time today to go into the like the level of just.

[A]

Yes, but perhaps on another. Perhaps on another investigative type multi part program, if you will.

[B]

Yeah, and another project in my rewilding podcast, I'll give more of the details. But yeah, it was quite dramatic from Mark Simmons point of view of how this went.

[A]

Yeah, boy feelings.

[B]

But yeah, so yeah, they decided to not be a part of the project. And honestly they were kind of using that as their resignation. They were kind of using as a bargaining chip of like, okay, well we'll tell them this is what we want and if they don't give us what we want, then we'll resign. And they thought that that would convince the board, but apparently it didn't. So the board felt they didn't need them anymore. And he just describes in a lot of his book how he just felt like the conflicting motivations and agendas of people involved were really frustrating to him and he felt like led to this kind of, like I said, this kind of narrative thread sort of starting to fray a little bit. Like it's just not as clean, it's not as satisfying.

[A]

Like people have differing kind of versions of what they say happened. Maybe.

[B]

Yeah. Yes, exactly. Yeah.

[A]

And also, and not to say this cuts across the board at all, but it does seem like with Mark Simmons and Robin Friday that you do have two people who are like pretty well qualified to know what they're talking about, but who, because of that, are not even pessimistic, but maybe less convinced that the specific goal that was stated from the outcome is achievable than people who know less. And maybe there's a name for that distribution. I'm sure there is. But that seems noticeable to me that the more, you know, generally in any project, I mean, this is like a, you know, not to compare this to Fyre Fest, because again, it's, you know, like, people were dedicated. They knew what they were doing to the greatest extent possible in many ways. And, like, the amount of love and care that went into this is really clear. But, like, there are projects that people can take on with great confidence because they don't understand how hard the different elements of it are going to be individually or to bring together. And, like, that's not the kind of confidence you want usually. Sometimes it works out, but that's just maybe the same thing as luck when that happens.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Or I guess that beginner's luck of not psyching yourself out too much. But that's such a big part of the American character that you can come in as a novice, fake your way through and be amazing at it. And it's like. Yeah, I mean, kind of for some things, there's definitely sort of workplace cultures that require fresh eyes kind of continually. And that's, you know, there's a certain logic to that. But also that can also just be ego talking. Right. That can just as easily be someone who's like, on a kind of a power trip and chooses to believe that about themselves. I think it really. It goes in both directions.

[B]

Right. And I think that's especially true for a project like this where there's, like.

[A]

Such a specific science background that you need.

[B]

Yeah, a specific science background. But then, like, the project as a whole has this almost like fairy tale quality to it. And so being able to pull it off, like, the appeal of that, I totally understand. I would love to be involved in a project like that. Now, I'm not saying it's not worth pursuing, but it's just like, it's very.

[A]

Worth doing things imperfectly. That's the only way to do it.

[B]

Yes, exactly.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And it's just a matter of maybe being a little bit more observant of how things are actually happening in front of you rather than how you think they should or you want them to play out in your head. Because reality is always messier.

[A]

And this is maybe. I mean, okay, not to get into, like, what is science? But just a sec. If we may just for a quick sec. Because I feel like this is such a, kind of a running joke at this point. And I love the sincerity of this. When people have a sign that's like, in this house we believe science and right, etc. Etc. You know, science is real. Yeah. And it's like great. But also like the point of science is not to be believed unequivocally. Like that's what's great about it. Like the point of science is that it's not a practice of faith or a belief, but of constant like iterating and experimenting. And that doesn't mean that evolution is a theory. Like it is a proven theory to the extent that we can ever know anything as human beings. But it feels like that is part of why science, I think is like, I don't know that we have this fallacy that kids can only learn something if they're going to do it for their whole lives and be really good at it. And it's like, no, there's aspects of the things that we do that just help us to be happier and better people and to, I would say, actually adapt better. Speaking of what we've been talking about to our situation as humans and one of them is this thing of teaching people the kind of, I don't know, like mental and intellectual resilience to be able to have theories and ideas and then use those ideas and those passions to gather information, to have experiences, to collect data and then to analyze that and revise their viewpoints based on what they learn and see, which is a wonderful thing to do. And not as many people seem to think, a shattering blow to your ego that you could literally die because of, you know, like it's a delight to be proven wrong. Yeah, it's definitely hard at times and it's definitely like a major act of bravery, especially if you're talking about a belief system that you've been raised within or something on that scale. But just in terms of day to day life, just realizing how little you know about something and getting to learn something, it's a delight.

[B]

Yeah, it is. And what you're saying too kind of reminds me of this thing that I think of often when people say I love science or science is real or kind of leaning into that. Oh, science is a representation of unequivocal facts or something like that. It's that the word science defines a process.

[A]

Right. It's not like a set of beliefs, it's like a way of interacting with the world maybe more accurately.

[B]

Right. It's almost like I feel like science, instead of it being a noun, I feel like we need a verb because I think science is an action.

[A]

Oh, you're sciencing pretty hard. You're sciencing right in front of me.

[B]

Science so hard. Yeah, that's true.

[A]

It should be a verb, right?

[B]

Yeah, it's an active thing that you do. I think when people say I love science, they love facts. And that's great. I love facts, too, and there's really interesting facts about the world. But I think we need to kind of distinguish between facts and the process at which maybe, like, if you love.

[A]

Science, then, like, you're loving science in the way that I loved science. When I was on a really long road trip and I drove away from a gas station, and then I think there was like a. Like a bandana or something that I wasn't sure what had happened to it, so I wondered if I'd left it on top of the car. And so to test my theory, I found like a microfiber cloth and put that on top of the car and then drove around to see if it would fall off. Off like that, to me, is science.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

It's not even useful or productive or relevant. Science.

[B]

Well, it's useful to you, perhaps.

[A]

Science. I had a theory and I tested it and I was like, well, I.

[B]

Don'T know which, honestly is. Most of science is testing something and be like, huh, well, hard to say that didn't work hard.

[A]

A little of this, a little of that. Yeah, just. And the hard to say is they're kind of the best because the pressure to produce results, I mean, it's like the process of questioning and learning is a joy unto itself, I really think. I mean, not always. And especially if it's your work, then work isn't always fun. If you're in academia, if you're chasing grant funding, a lot of stuff in any profession is drudgery. But that act of trying to learn and that spark that you feel, that's the point.

[B]

Yeah. And that process of learning, that was integral to this Keiko project, that this really was a process of trying something new and doing something that hadn't been done before and getting the best people on it that you can find with the best expertise, but still kind of stepping into the unknown. And I think there were a lot of people involved that were very grounded and understood, like, okay, like, this could go in a lot of different directions. And then there were some people that were really hopeful and aspirational and perhaps clung onto the idea that Keiko would swim off into the sunset with his family. Maybe a little too. You know, they clung on a little too hard. So where we are at right now in the story is that after this negative interaction, it seems as though Keiko had a few more interactions with wild whales that year and the following year as well. And for the most part, from what I can tell, wild whales would kind of swim by Keiko, and he would kind of look at them and watch them and maybe follow a little bit. But he was. He was never, you know, really going off to swim with them.

[A]

I mean, that was about as much as I knew about socializing in middle school. It took time for me personally.

[B]

Yeah. He was probably like, okay, this is interesting, but I can imagine. I don't know, maybe it was scary. Like, for a social animal, social anxiety exists.

[A]

I mean, you sure can't introduce adult cats to each other. That's neither here nor there. But it's very true.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I mean, you can. But as anyone who's done it knows it takes sometimes forever.

[B]

Yeah. And so they're doing this over the year, but I think over this time period, well, I think the morale of the project started to lessen a bit. Like, people were a bit, like, okay, maybe Keiko won't make it. And then this starts to translate into, well, notably Craig McCaw sort of being like, all right, well, we gotta wrap this up. Like, do you.

[A]

Why do you just stick it out?

[B]

Right.

[A]

What else are you gonna spend that money on? You're gonna buy yourself some more wine?

[B]

Well, apparently, he was going through some of his own financial troubles at the time. He had to sell his yacht.

[A]

Get it together.

[B]

Craig and his island in Vancouver, bc.

[A]

Oh, mon dieu.

[B]

I know. I think he's doing okay now. But, you know, it was hard times on the farm then.

[A]

Yeah. He was weeping into his bleak moonlit pillow.

[B]

Yeah. But anyway, he was looking for his way out of the project, and he asked Phillips, like, hey, do you. Do you want your whale back? And Phillips was like, sure, whatever. And also a part of this was.

[A]

He left this whale at my house.

[B]

No, I'm sure he was more enthusiastic than that. But they had this benefactor, and now he was walking away. And part of that was Craig McCaw and his wife at that time had recently gone through a divorce, and it was rumored that Wendy McCaw was the one more invested in the project. So as soon as they got divorced, Craig McCaw was like, okay, I'm doing other things now.

[A]

I mean, look, it would not be the most Shocking thing that I had heard today, if that was true, I'll tell you that. Yeah.

[B]

But anyway, so that was kind of the atmosphere of the project. It was sort of. There was, in my sense, it was almost like this feeling of not completely yet, but like this winding down. So there was big changes in staff because there were huge budget cuts. And it was funny because they. I don't think they wanted to actually lay anyone off. So they made very significant cuts in other departments. And it just put a lot of stressors on the project. And then the people that were most qualified to be involved with the project stepped away because they were like, well, I can't do my best work with not enough resources. Like, you guys need to figure this out. So that was kind of the attitude or the atmosphere of project. And this was around 2001 and then into July 2002, and they're continuing to bring Keiko out to interact with wild whales. They have a new setup where they actually have a large boat that they can stay on for, like, I guess, weeks at a time. It's like an old fishing boat. And so then they can actually stay out at sea for long periods if there's whales around and not have to return back to the bay all the time. So that. And then they had their smaller vessels that would kind of go out with Keiko.

[A]

And are they still feeding him while they're on these excursions?

[B]

I believe so. But they're, like, also really reducing the amount of food that they're giving Keiko to.

[A]

Yeah, they're, like, weaning him kind of.

[B]

Yeah. And they also had the attitude. There was the attitude like, well, we can't keep feeding him because then he'll keep relying on us for food. Like, if he gets hungry enough, he'll go and get his own food. But sometimes that kind of backfired and that kind of just made him hang out around people more. There was again, just this apparent misunderstanding of just animal psychology and, like, what the best way forward was to actually train Keiko to take. Do what they wanted him to do.

[A]

Yeah, I guess, like, a lack of consensus. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

But somewhere around this time and about, like, July 2002, he has been kind of on the outskirts of a pod of wild whales and has been kind of, you know, doing his thing where he's kind of watching them from a distance and kind of wandering off, but then eventually wandering back. And then at one of these points where he wanders off and he would wander, like, you know, a few miles away and they would just kind of let him wander, but he would always eventually wander back. A storm comes in and is coming in really fast, and the crew is like, oh, my gosh, we have to get back to shore, like, now. And they all go back to the bay, and they try to signal Keiko to come back to the boat. They have this little. This thing that makes a tone underwater that calls Keiko back, kind of like a whistle for a sheepdog or something, but he doesn't come back. So they go back, and then they start tracking him with his satellite tag, and they see that he's moving east. So from Iceland, like, moving out east, he goes towards the Faroe Islands. And then he.

[A]

He wanted to get a sweater.

[B]

And then he eventually makes his way to Norway, and they're kind of, like, keeping an eye out, like, seeing if they hear any. The people are seeing if they hear anything. They're like, okay, I don't know. Maybe he's with whales. Maybe he's swimming with whales.

[A]

But they're, like, separated from him kind of unintentionally, basically. Like, they weren't planning for that to be it.

[B]

No, I don't. I didn't get the impression that that was intentional. I think they were, like, hopeful and very. You know, they were like this. It could be it, but it wasn't. They'd had so many instances of this happening of, like, KO kind of wandering off, but always wandering back, that I think it was hard to, you know, believe that this could be the time that they don't see him again.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But anyway, he wanders off to Norway and Keiko, and this is, like, three weeks later. So there's three weeks where Keiko is maybe with other whales, maybe not, but he's out in the open ocean, which. I don't know. That is also just an incredible thing for me to think about.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

For this whale that was in a tank, and now he's literally traveling across the ocean to. I believe that part of the ocean is called the Norwegian Sea. And he's making his way to Norway whether he knew it or not. And he gets there, and he immediately finds a boat with a family that's out for a day of fishing. Well, what do you know? And the family apparently was, like, really freaked out. They're like, what the hell is this whale doing? You know, killer whales have a reputation.

[A]

If they're Americans, they would have called the cops.

[B]

Oh, no, don't call the cops on Keiko.

[A]

That really happened once. There was this viral video, like, 10 years ago of A couple calling the cops on a whale.

[B]

Really?

[A]

Not that they wanted the whale to be arrested, but, yeah, they're freaking out, and they called the police.

[B]

Oh, my gosh. That's, like, when my. I love my dad, but he did. I mean, I actually don't think this is totally misguided, but my family has a boat, and they were on the Willamette river in Portland, and the engine cut out, they lost power, and my dad called the Coast Guard, and that does seem hasty. And the Coast Guard was like, no, you gotta try a few other things first before you call us. Also, like, are you in immediate danger? He's like, no, we're just kind of, like, floating here, and we can't get to shore.

[A]

Okay. Do you want to hear about the whale video from Time magazine or Scuba diving magazine?

[B]

Oh, Scuba diving magazine.

[A]

I figured. Yeah. Okay, let me read this to you. I feel like you'll like this.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

A beautiful humpback whale encounter turned into fodder for a viral video after a woman called the cops on the cetacean. A group enjoying the day on Washington's Puget Sound got spooked when a whale came close for a visit.

[B]

It.

[A]

The video, which is drawing laughs and some criticism after going viral online, ends with one woman calling the police. I'm out in Puget Sound, and there's three huge gray whales underneath our boat, and I'm afraid that we might get flipped over. The woman says on the phone. I don't want to die right now, says another passenger in the background.

[B]

Oh, my gosh.

[A]

So if you're kayaking around and you see humpback whales, and if you feel scared about that is, what should you do, Brianna?

[B]

Oh, my gosh. Just watch them and enjoy them. They're not gonna do anything. I mean, there is a very small risk that a humpback whale could jump out of the water and hit your boat. That has happened. There is, like, instances of that. That is so incredibly rare. Just enjoy being in the presence of, like, an amazing animal who's also probably looking at you like, oh, you're pretty interesting and acting really str. And it's probably just curious about you too. I would just. I would love to be there and see these humpback whales.

[A]

I would, too.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Yeah. So there. So Keiko finds a family in Norway.

[B]

He finds a family, and they basically. He basically follows them back to their village and, like, their little fishing village, and he just, like, hangs out in this bay or in this fjord, and immediately the whole town is like, oh, my Gosh, there's a whale here. And there is incredible footage and pictures of kids like, you know, 9, 10 year olds riding on Keiko's back. What?

[A]

Wait, can we watch that?

[B]

Yes, I've got it. It's a Norwegian documentary that was made called Kompen om Keiko.

[A]

I'm so excited. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Look at him go. He's so big.

[B]

I know. He's got three little spots on his chin. So this was all. I think this is all footage in Norway of him swimming. So he's like jumping out of the water.

[A]

Oh, no. He's like near a pasture with cows. He's like a pasture next to a bay, which you don't really think of.

[B]

Yeah. And there's a person on a boat. And can you see his tag and Keiko's.

[A]

Yeah, and Keiko's like swimming alongside the boat.

[B]

It looks like the person like reaches out to touch him when he, like, comes up for a breath.

[A]

This is beautiful footage. I know. We'll put a link to this in our description.

[B]

Okay. Here's the kids playing. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. I know. Isn't this incredible?

[A]

It is just a Bobby Hill looking child just literally in the water on Keiko's back.

[B]

Yeah. And now there's like kids in a boat. They're gonna like row out to him or something.

[A]

And the kids are like kind of partially submerged too. So they're not like standing around on him or something, which feels different.

[B]

But he's just kind of hanging out near their little rowboat.

[A]

Yeah. And we have like two kids in the water kind of treating him as like a. Like a floating dock A little bit.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Just kind of like lying on his back in their bathing suits.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah.

[A]

Oh, my God.

[B]

And he's just sitting there like he could. He is a large, powerful animal. He could easily just toss them off.

[A]

This is an amazing image. This is a 12 year old girl in a bathing suit just like lying across Keiko's back. Like he's just. And I have no. You know. But yeah, like, not that I know what he's feeling, but he sure is lying very still allowing this to happen.

[B]

I know. He's. Yeah, I think. I don't know. I think it's safe to say he's really enjoying it. And he, like, you know, he's been through all these. He just swam, you know, maybe by himself, maybe with other whales, but across the Norwegian Sea he was. When he was in Iceland, you know, there was all these protocols about not interacting With Keiko very much, like, trying to detach from him, and then he arrives in this town, and immediately is all these people are just, like, giving him all of this attention and love and affection and.

[A]

And to the envy of every Oregonian child.

[B]

I know. Seriously.

[A]

I know. I know. Oh, God.

[B]

But, yeah, this whole video is worth a watch. It's, like, 45 minutes long.

[A]

Yeah. And again, like, a case here where, like, he's giant compared to these children. You know? Like, it's just. It feels. I don't know. It's actually very much like Sam Neill and the triceratops.

[B]

Yes, it is. Yeah.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

He could. He could easily swim away. Like, I mean, if anything, kids may want to be a little concerned that they might get hurt.

[A]

And again, like. And it gets us in trouble that we see an orca, and we're like, I want to lie on top of that guy, you know?

[B]

I know. I know. We definitely shouldn't, because it's like, we want these things.

[A]

We don't want to want them, and maybe we don't want to want them so much that we project that sometimes. And, like, I mean, in your opinion, did Keiko get separated from his people during the storm and just, like, keep on swimming until he found some kids to play with?

[B]

Honestly, that is what I think happened. I don't know. That's my opinion. My opinion is that maybe he followed some whales for a while, but I think he ended up on his own. I mean, when he was found in Norway, he was by himself, and I think he saw a boat and was like, oh, that boat probably has people on it. And he's just conditioned to want to socialize with people.

[A]

Right.

[B]

I'm not sure at this point in his life that that could have successfully been deprogrammed from him.

[A]

Right.

[B]

You know, and this was something that we learned in this project. I think that was a big learning. Like, people were hesitant from the beginning. They're like, wow, he's been in captivity a long time. I don't know.

[A]

I mean, it's kind of like the genie experiment in linguistics, where you have this child who's been a victim of terrible abuse, where she's been isolated and not taught how to speak literally. And then the question is, can you teach someone how to speak after this kind of theorized critical period of language learning has ended, like, kind of mid and post puberty. And it's this weird thing where you don't really have of. It's just this one isolated study, but it does still. There's like the thing of being able to test a question and then the phenomenon of people kind of moving on when the answer turns out to be no, and then the question of what happens to this test subject, who is stuck the way they are, for better or worse, and can they be protected for being exactly that thing, and whatever those needs that they have now are, you know.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I think that was, you know, at the end of the CAICO project, that was the question that kind of needed to be answered. And it was written into some of their protocols. It was like, okay, well, if he shows that he can't successfully integrate with wild whales, then he's going to need care. Like, we're going to need to take care of him. We can't ethically release him. And also, it's just for his safety, because obviously he's going to seek out people. And the thing is, I think some people are like, well, what's the big deal if he wants to seek out people? Isn't that okay? And the issue with that is that it can be a safety hazard for Keiko. It could be a safety hazard for people, too, depending. But, I mean, Keiko was such a friendly whale. I don't think he was. Well, I don't know. He wasn't at risk of being aggressive, I think. But the issue was, people are weird. If there's this. This whale hanging out, who knows, someone could try to hurt him or someone could hurt him unintentionally. That unfortunately, happened with the whale Luna, who was a little killer whale off of British Columbia. That was a wild whale that became very friendly and was kind of similar to Keiko, wasn't letting people ride on him and wasn't allowed, but he was interacting with people like this, like coming up to boats and everything. And there was a lot of debate on what to do with him, because he was a wild whale, but he was interacting with people. And then in the end, he got hit by a boat in the harbor. And it wasn't intentional. It was just that he was hanging out near a boat and the guy didn't see him, and the guy who did it felt terrible.

[A]

Yeah. But our environment is very. I mean, humans have a very hard time surviving the environment that we built for ourselves. So imagine how much harder it is if you don't, you know, if you don't even have that going for you.

[B]

Yeah. How do we strike that balance of wanting to give this animal as much as their own autonomy as we can while also still providing for them? Because we've kind of Taken away their ability to take care of themselves.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And I don't know. I don't know that anyone could ever have like a really clear, articulate answer to that. You know, it's just something you have to, to feel out and do by trial and error. And I think actually, you know, I'm saying that the end of the Keiko story is like a little sad. The project continued and people stayed involved and continued to care for him. It was just that the level of resources that were there previously weren't there anymore. So like, the amount of staff involved was really reduced. And that kind of translated into, okay, well, was he getting sufficient veterinary care in the end? And like, what would be sufficient veterinary care? You know, if you're like trying to kind of have this half wild whale, like, what does that look like? So when Keiko showed up in this town, some new staff and trainers, a couple of people showed up and found Keiko and they were like, oh, Keiko, why did you do this? But, you know, they were like, okay, well, we gotta find like a plan, Plan B. Obviously he's going to try to seek people out. We'll try to set up a station here in Norway somewhere. So they brought him around to a different bay nearby that was more isolated. And that sort of became the base of the Keiko project for the remainder of Keiko's days, which wasn't really much longer. It was like. So he arrived in Norway in August, September 2002, and he was there for about a year and a half. And, you know, they continued with his ocean walks. They'd take him out, he would interact with some of the whales coming by, but again, in that kind of distant kind of way. He would wander off occasionally and they would just follow him just to make sure he was okay. He had a incident where he got trapped under some ice in the winter and he.

[A]

Oh, Keiko.

[B]

I know. And he. It's really sad because he like, he got trapped under the ice and. Yeah, he couldn't figure out, like, where to go to breathe. And apparently he was like punching holes through the ice and he ended up just mashing up his head. Like it became really bloody and scarred, I believe. Yeah, like he was in a really. He was in a very desperate situation in that moment. But they're doing his thing there. There's a couple of people, an Icelandic woman named Toba and a man named Frank and another guy named Dane, I believe, and Colin, Colin Baird. They were the kind of remaining staff during that last year with Keiko. And they really loved him. Everyone who worked with Keiko loved Keiko. They just, like, yeah, he was a creature that they had a personal connection with, and they would really do anything for him. And I really mean, like, they would do anything. And so they're doing the best they can taking care of him. And the leaders of the project are trying to figure out what they're gonna do next, trying to keep funding going. But, you know, the motivation and the enthusiasm for the project has kind of waned at this point because it's just kind of clear that it's a messy ending. It's not the clear ending that everyone wanted.

[A]

And it's easy to fundraise, to make a great leap or do something heroic, and it's harder to fundraise for. We just kind of need to take care of this whale for the rest of his life because it's our responsibility. And people get less excited about that, but they should get excited about it because it's very exciting to keep taking care of creatures and places in an ongoing way.

[B]

Yeah. I believe it was in Mark Simmons book. He made the point that not to be too cynical, but there was a financial incentive to have Keiko go free. Well, yeah, you know, say more about that.

[A]

What is the incentive for people that.

[B]

If Keiko goes free, then we don't have to pay for his care anymore, you know?

[A]

Yeah. And also, everybody gets to pat each other on the back and feel really accomplished, as opposed to feeling immersed in the complexity of, like, interspecies relationships, which is where we got stuck here.

[B]

Right.

[A]

It seems like.

[B]

I want to say that when it was brought up, like, well, there's a possibility that he won't go free and that we'll be having to take care of him for, you know, potentially the rest of his life. I feel like the attitude about it was sort of like, yeah, yeah, that's a possibility, but he's gonna go free. Like, it's gonna happen.

[A]

But it's like when you're signing a prenup, when you're marrying that billionaire whose family seems so nice.

[B]

Right? Yes, exactly.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You just. You don't want to think about the kind of negative outcome, I guess. Even though it wasn't necessarily. It's not a negative outcome. It's just. Yeah, it's not what we wanted necessarily. But again, it just ended up being messier. And so I kind of remember this period of the project because my ears would always perk up if I heard anything about Keiko. And I remember feeling as a kid that there was Kind of like radio silence for a little while. And I was sort of like, okay, I don't know, maybe he's. Maybe he's fine. I don't know. And then later in 2003, Keiko, throughout his adult life, had been kind of plagued with a recurring respiratory illness. I want to say they saw symptoms of it as far back as in the Oregon Coast Aquarium, but definitely in Iceland. They would see this kind of flare up of a respiratory illness. And when he would get sick, he would get antibiotics. They'd be taking blood samples to monitor his white blood cell count and making sure that he got the care that he needed. And the thing with animals, and I think especially with a not domesticated animal, because even though Keiko was captive, I wouldn't. I don't know if I'd say he's necessarily domesticated.

[A]

He's not born of thousands of generations of. Of creatures that are used to living with people. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

Animals are really good at hiding symptoms because they don't.

[A]

Like chickens. Yeah.

[B]

It's just. It's amazing how far along an animal is in an illness before you really start to notice that they're. They're not doing so well. And especially with a whale, because even though, as you and I have talked about a few times, like, we feel like we can sense their feelings and maybe project our own feelings onto them, it would be hard to look at a whale and be like, hey, buddy, are you feeling okay? Like, how would you, you know, like, the demeanor of a whale? I'm sure people that spend time around whales would be able to tell, but.

[A]

Yeah, but even so.

[B]

Yeah, but even so. And that's the thing, too, that the people that were involved that were taking care of Keiko at the end, like, Toba, this was her first time working with a killer whale. She. She had worked at an aquarium in Iceland, but she had never worked with killer whales before. So, I mean, they're doing their absolute best, but, yeah, they just don't have the experience, and they just have limited resources at this point. So after a year of being in Norway, in this. In this bay, they notice one day that Keiko just seems to be pretty lethargic. You know, they take him out for an ocean walk, and he's lagging behind, and they bring him back, and they're like, oh, man, he doesn't seem to be feeling very well. They do what they can with, you know, getting whatever tests they can run and antibiotics, but it was sort of at the point where the infection had kind of reached a Point of potentially no return. In December, he's getting worse, and he's just kind of doing what they say is what they call logging. So, like, a whale just kind of hangs out at the surface and isn't swimming. They're just floating there. And he was doing a lot of that conserving energy. And he eventually just passed away from this respiratory illness and beached himself on the shore there, or was trying to make his way onto the shore. But I feel like there was a net in the way. I'm a little unclear of what happened, but, yeah, it was a pneumonia or some other virus that got him when he was about 27 years old.

[A]

I'm not even gonna make a Janis Joplin reference. That's how sad this is.

[B]

Yeah, I know. I've thought about that, too. Put Keiko on the poster with all the other 27 club people. But, yeah, it feels like a really. I don't know, I guess sometimes it just feels like an underwhelming ending to this incredible story. But that's in reality, what happened. And he had some people with him that. That really loved him and really cared about him. And I remember seeing the newspaper article in the paper, and I remember crying when I was a little kid. It just, you know, this. This beautiful animal that we put so much of our heart and love and attention into and had so many aspirations and had so many dreams for him. And again, like, we actually did achieve a lot of that. That's the thing. Like, I think in the process of researching this story, I think in the beginning, I was quick to call the Keiko project a failure because he didn't swim off into the sunset with his family. But in really diving into the story and really understanding all the different complexities of it and all the different motivations and what people were trying to achieve, like, I really do believe that there were huge successes in the Keiko story. Like, we really did put a whale back in the ocean and back in his home. And I can't. I can't understate how important that is in terms of understanding how we can. How we can, I don't know, try to put the world back the way we found it. And maybe we learned that we can't totally do that, but we can get really close and we can, you know.

[A]

Well, and also, we don't have to give up because we don't get to have the exact result that we imagined, you know?

[B]

Right, Exactly. And so one of the main things, actually, I think one of the really important legacies that Keiko left was all of this stuff that people learned throughout this whole project. And one of the things that we learned was like, okay, we really, really tried to put a captive whale back in the wild and captivity just, it's almost impossible to reverse that and their dependence on people. And so there is a happy medium that people are trying to strike with current captive orcas in this project called the whale Sanctuary project. And it actually involves quite a few people that were involved with the Caico project. So the whale sanctuary project is going to be a large sanctuary in Port Hillford Bay in Nova Scotia where whales and dolphins can live in an environment that really maximizes their well being and is in their natural habitat. And so we can take animals, these really intelligent, socially complex animals and have them live out a retirement in this whale sanctuary project so they won't be having to perform in order to be.

[A]

Fed, which is what we all want, really.

[B]

Right. And we, we're, you know, they're going to be in the ocean again and we can just try to right a wrong as best as we can in using what we learned. And, and part of what we learned is that, well, okay, full reintroduction into the wild may not be realistic, but we can still provide a good life for these animals.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

When we've taken away so much from them. So I'm really happy to see that that project is underway. And of course they're looking for funding a big project like that always, as we've learned, always requires a lot of.

[A]

Money and they don't have a movie to put a number at the end of, so it's going to be a little trickier maybe.

[B]

Oh, and actually also there's another kind of retirement quote unquote facility for whales and that's in Keiko's old sea pen in Iceland. So there's a few, there's some belugas that live there now and they're just, you know, living out their days.

[A]

Would you say that they're swimming so wild and swimming so free?

[B]

Yes, they are.

[A]

Of heaven above and sea below.

[B]

Yeah, they're, you know, I think it's just, it's the best we can offer and I think it's actually pretty, a pretty generous thing for us to do after the harm that we've exerted on these animals with the captivity industry, with the everything.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

So that's the story of Keiko and I love him.

[A]

I love him too. And I know there's more to it and you're working on a podcast series about it. And we're going to have you come back on here and tell us when it's out so nobody misses it.

[B]

Yeah, that would be great. Yeah. I am currently working on it. If you would like to support my work on this project, you can go to the Patreon. It's called the Rewilding Keiko Podcast. And also another place I would love to get people's memories of Keiko. If, you know, if you were a kid in Oregon and you remember visiting Keiko.

[A]

Or Norway.

[B]

Or Norway. If you were one of those kids kids riding on Keiko's back, I want to hear from you. And you can email me or submit a voice memo to rewilding podcast outlook.com that's my spiel.

[A]

Thank you. And that's your whale.

[B]

That's my whale. That's Keiko. Sa. With thee. You are my friend. Carry me like you are my brother. Love me like a mother. Will you be there? Foreign.

[A]

Part journey with Keiko. You're listening right now to a cover of Will youl Be There? Performed by Magpie Cinema Club. Magpie Cinema Club is a band featuring Miranda Zickler, who is also the editor and producer of youf're Wrong about, and musician AJ McKinley. Thank you to Brianna Bowman for being our Dolphin Girl and Orca Woman. Thank you to Nicole Ortiz, our administrative assistant. And thank you for listening. We'll see you next time.

[B]

Sam.