0:00

Hey, I'm Robert Vinlow and I'm from

0:02

New York Times Games, and I'm

0:04

here talking to people about Wordle

0:07

and the Wordle archive. Do you

0:09

all play Wordle? I play it

0:11

every day. All right, I have something

0:13

exciting to show you. It's the

0:15

Wordle archive. What? Okay, that's awesome.

0:17

So now you can play every

0:20

wordle that has ever existed. There's

0:22

like a thousand puzzles? What? New

0:24

York Times game subscribers can now

0:27

access the entire World archive. Find

0:29

out more at nytimes.com slash games.

0:31

In the beginning we thought of them

0:33

as monsters. See monsters out of

0:35

some saltwater nightmare. We called them

0:38

orcas or killer whales. Emissaries from

0:40

the kingdom of the dead. The

0:42

first live orca ever captured and

0:44

shown to the public was actually

0:47

caught by accident. This was 1964

0:49

and an expedition left Vancouver

0:51

with a simple sadistic errand.

0:53

Killinorka and bring back its

0:56

carcass so an artist might sculpt

0:58

a life-size replica for the local aquarium.

1:00

The media were captivated by the

1:02

story of these brave hunters who

1:04

left town and were expected to

1:06

return within a week. But that's not

1:08

how it happened in fact. Nearly two

1:11

months passed before they finally managed to

1:13

harpoon a killer whale who inconvenienced them

1:15

all by failing to die. So they dragged

1:17

it, wounded but still alive for about 20

1:20

hours back to Vancouver. The animal was

1:22

put on display in a shipyard

1:24

where it received thousands of visitors.

1:26

So many the aquarium curator began

1:28

to suspect it might be worth

1:30

more alive than dead. An aquarium

1:32

in California offered $20,000 for the

1:34

animal, but they refused to sell. 55

1:37

days after its capture, the orca ate for

1:39

the first time in captivity. This was a

1:41

big enough deal that it made it into

1:44

the local paper. And then, a month later,

1:46

after nearly 90 days in captivity, it was

1:48

dead. The whale's death was

1:50

likely related to exhaustion. The water where

1:52

it was kept was less salty and

1:55

therefore less buoyant than the ocean it

1:57

was accustomed to. What now seems self-evidently

1:59

cruel or barbaric, back then

2:02

simply was. And no one

2:04

seems to have thought much of

2:07

it. Jeff Foster was just a

2:09

kid when this happened, growing up

2:11

not so far away, across the

2:13

border in Seattle. And this first

2:16

orca capture would come to shape

2:18

his life in profound ways,

2:20

though he might not come right

2:23

out and admit it. And I don't

2:25

really like talking about myself very much, so

2:27

it's always a little bit awkward. But yeah,

2:29

so I kind of grew up with animals

2:31

all my life. Jeff's dad was a

2:33

full-time zoo veterinarian, which had its privileges

2:35

and made for a unique childhood. His dad

2:38

might come home some nights with an animal

2:40

that needed special care, a baby lion or

2:42

leopard, an otter or a monkey. Jeff loved it.

2:44

At 12, he was catching rattlesnakes for fun.

2:47

By the time he was a teenager, he

2:49

had a teenager, he had a Seattle Marine

2:51

Aquarium. 15 years old at sea on

2:53

fishing boats doing exactly the kind of

2:55

work that would set the Keko story

2:57

in motion. That is, capturing killer

2:59

whales for display at marine parks.

3:01

The whole world, it seems, had

3:04

learned precisely the wrong lesson from

3:06

the abrupt death of that first

3:08

captive orca. Now marine parks across

3:10

the world wanted one of their own,

3:12

and it was Jeff's job to get them.

3:14

It was dangerous work. In the beginning,

3:16

they'd used firecrackersers to herd the

3:18

whales into shallow areas. Later, they'd

3:20

pay fishing boats to leave some

3:22

of their hall floating in the

3:25

water. When the workers showed up

3:27

to feed, Jeff and his team

3:29

would trap them in nets. It was

3:31

the young ones they'd go after, under

3:33

five years old or so, but still

3:35

huge. Once their target was trapped,

3:37

Jeff would jump in. And then my job is

3:39

to get in the water and try to

3:41

get him out of the nets and put

3:43

him on stretchers and load him onto

3:45

the boat. You could die, or the or

3:47

the orker could die, or you could both die.

3:50

You know, it's, you know, it's a

3:52

huge adventure. It's extremely exciting. It's, it's,

3:54

it's, it's, it was really something, you

3:56

know, to be involved with something like

3:58

this. It was a massive scale. Jeff

4:00

estimates that over two decades, first

4:02

impuged sound, and then eventually in

4:04

Iceland, he helped capture as many

4:06

as 20 killer whales. But over

4:08

time, as a scientific community, as

4:10

a scientific community and in the

4:12

public, began to understand that orchas

4:14

were intelligent social creatures with strong

4:16

family bonds, that they had their

4:18

own sophisticated language with different dialects,

4:20

Jeff's feelings shifted too. Was there

4:22

a moment where you were like,

4:24

oh, this is too much, I

4:26

can't do this? Yeah, it kind

4:28

of kept building, you know, when

4:30

you bring these animals onto the

4:32

deck, they're, you know, they're, they're,

4:34

they're, they're, they're confused and they're,

4:36

you know, nervous and they make

4:38

a vocalization that sounds like a,

4:40

almost like a crying baby. It's,

4:42

it's, uh, it's pretty powerful. It's

4:44

not like a crying baby, actually.

4:46

It is a crying baby. And

4:48

the bond between a male orca

4:50

and its mother is particularly strong.

4:52

In fact, in some orca populations,

4:54

male orchas will live most of

4:56

their lives with their mothers, protected

4:58

by her, fed by her, even

5:00

swimming in her slip stream as

5:02

an adult. Taking a calf from

5:04

its mother is nothing less than

5:06

a kidnapping. You know, the more

5:08

I did it, the longer I

5:10

did it, the more we knew

5:12

about these animals that hit, you

5:14

know, that cry, you know, it

5:16

sticks with you. You know, you

5:18

always remember it. And

5:22

so in 1990, after two

5:24

decades catching wild whales, he

5:26

stopped. Eight years later, Jeff

5:28

found himself back in Iceland.

5:30

Only instead of capturing orchas,

5:32

this time he would be

5:34

helping one go free. And

5:36

here's where Jeff's story intersects

5:39

with ours. He was part

5:41

of the team that would

5:43

be helping get Keko back

5:45

to the ocean he'd been

5:47

ripped from when he was

5:49

just a calf. Now, in

5:51

Iceland, Keko's humans, Jeff among

5:53

them, were going to try

5:55

to make amends. Try to

5:57

fix something that had been

5:59

broken. something they had broken.

6:01

To achieve their audacious goal

6:03

they had to try, no

6:05

matter the odds, to prepare

6:07

Keko for freedom, to train

6:09

him, to be wild again.

6:11

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6:13

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6:16

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6:18

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6:57

You don't wake up dreaming of

6:59

McDonald's fries? You wake up dreaming

7:01

of McDonald's hash browns. McDonald's breakfast

7:03

comes first. B-a-pah-pah-pah-ba. It's September 10th,

7:06

1998. Keko's arrival in Iceland. It

7:08

took the freewilly Keko Foundation months

7:10

of negotiations with the Icelandic government

7:12

to get Keko back to his

7:15

home waters. And now, the day

7:17

was finally here. It has everything

7:19

we've come to expect with these

7:22

milestones in Keko's journey, the eyes

7:24

of the world nothing less. Aside

7:26

from Bjork, Keko was probably Iceland's

7:28

biggest celebrity and some kids got

7:31

the day off so they could

7:33

follow his arrival on television. Hey

7:35

Maya is the largest of the

7:37

Westman Islands and the only one

7:40

with any residence, though there aren't

7:42

many, fewer than 5,000. And here,

7:44

in this remote volcanic archipelago, was

7:46

where Keko would be living. On

7:49

the day of his arrival, the Little Island

7:51

is overwhelmed by crowds, the kind that gathered

7:54

any time Keko traveled. Locals and tourists lining

7:56

the streets, and over a hundred foreign journalists

7:58

who come to cover the... story. Many

8:00

of them stand clumped on

8:03

a green hillside at the

8:05

airport as a giant military

8:07

cargo plane approaches the not

8:09

very long island runway. Inside the

8:11

plane is a 45,000 pound piece

8:14

of cargo, Keko, floating in a

8:16

fiberglass cradle. The landing was

8:18

a near disaster. Fierce crosswinds

8:20

buffeted the plane as it pulled

8:22

in. It touched down with a

8:25

jolt so violent that the landing

8:27

gear buckled in a cloud of

8:29

smoke. Inside the cargo hold, water

8:31

spilled over the top of Keko's container.

8:34

Jeff says they heard a big loud

8:36

pop and we stopped really quickly. Jeff

8:38

and another trainer named Brian and

8:41

Keko's veterinarian, Lanny Cornell, all went

8:43

to check on Keko while everyone

8:45

else waited to get off the plane.

8:48

And I jumped into the cradle

8:50

with Keko and he just stopped.

8:52

He was just frozen. And Brian

8:54

was saying, breathe the dude, breathe

8:56

the dude. And uh... Dr. Cornell

8:58

was saying, you know, I think

9:00

he's dead. I think he's dead

9:02

and I'm in the water with

9:04

him and I was poking next

9:06

to his eye and he wouldn't

9:08

wouldn't blink and I was,

9:10

you know, pushing on his

9:13

blowhole and trying to get it

9:15

open and and he just

9:17

wouldn't wouldn't move. I mean,

9:19

he was just like frozen. It

9:21

seemed like forever, but it

9:23

was probably maybe 10 minutes.

9:26

And then he started,

9:28

and breathed, you

9:31

know, and catching his

9:33

breath. Alive. His

9:35

breathing lessons back

9:37

in Oregon had

9:39

paid off, apparently. Now,

9:41

Keko had made it

9:44

to Iceland, into the

9:46

biggest body of water

9:48

he'd been in since

9:50

he was a calf.

9:54

And so we got him out of the stretcher and

9:56

you know we opened the stretcher up and he slammed up

9:58

for the first time and he dove down. and

10:04

went into water, we didn't see

10:06

him for a minute or two,

10:08

and then he popped up. He

10:10

came over and I rubbed him

10:12

down. Thank you. Thank you. He's

10:14

doing so well. You know, and he

10:17

just came over to me, like

10:19

a security blanket. You know, I

10:21

told him, yeah, this is all

10:23

right, you're home now. Home is a

10:25

tricky concept, of course, but

10:27

let's consider where he is.

10:30

First, well, there's his sea pen, a

10:32

massive enclosure about two-thirds the size of

10:34

a football field. Think of it as

10:36

a permeable tank with thick nylon netting

10:38

instead of walls floating in the middle

10:40

of the bay and anchored to the

10:43

sea floor. It had been built from

10:45

nearly 200,000 pounds of metal,

10:47

plastic, aluminum, and rubber, and

10:49

was designed to withstand waves

10:51

and storms. All told, it was

10:53

60% larger than Keko's pool in

10:55

Oregon, which, if you'll recall, was

10:57

itself much larger than his home

10:59

in Mexico City. But beyond the

11:01

size of it, most importantly, crucially,

11:04

the pen is in the ocean,

11:06

like the actual ocean, with all

11:08

the sights and sounds and tastes

11:10

and stimulation that implies. Keko could

11:12

feel the waves and the currents and

11:14

the tides, feel his body being

11:16

pulled effortlessly this way and that,

11:18

something he had an experience

11:21

since he was a calf. and he was

11:23

no longer subjected to the echoes

11:25

of a walled tank. He could

11:27

distinguish individual sounds of different species

11:29

of ocean life could tell which

11:32

direction a specific animal might be

11:34

coming from. For a species that echo

11:36

locates, this might be like suddenly

11:38

seeing normally after a lifetime of

11:40

having a flashlight shown in your

11:42

eyes. Herring and minky whales and

11:44

pilot whales populate the waters off

11:46

the Westman Islands, and they were close.

11:48

That very first afternoon, a pilot

11:50

whale swam into Kako's cove

11:52

as if stopping by to

11:54

see who was new in

11:56

town, even vocalizing with Kaker.

12:01

It was an auspicious sign, or

12:03

at least that's how it was

12:05

interpreted by the staff, and for

12:07

a whale who'd been living on

12:09

his own in a tank for

12:11

most of his life, just hearing

12:14

another marine mammal so close by,

12:16

must have been striking, maybe even

12:18

revelatory. So, set aside for just

12:20

a moment, the finger wagging about

12:22

not projecting human emotions onto animals.

12:24

Forget that. Instead, let's imagine the

12:26

interior life of this magnificent creature

12:29

with a brain several times larger

12:31

than her own. as he confronts

12:33

the weird intoxicating newness of his

12:35

environment, the turmoil it must have

12:37

caused him, the surprise, the curiosity.

12:39

Nothing is binary as happiness or

12:41

sadness, I'd guess. Maybe just awe,

12:44

maybe just an unsettling awareness that

12:46

the world was far bigger than

12:48

he'd ever understood it to be.

12:50

So that's his immediate environs, his

12:52

pen. Then there was the broader

12:54

setting. Keko's new home was in

12:56

the windy Westman Islands and despite

12:59

the scare of the rough landing,

13:01

once he was in the water,

13:03

it seemed like an inspired choice.

13:05

Everybody said, look how protected this

13:07

bay is. It was a perfectly

13:09

calm still day. It has 600

13:11

foot cliffs on three sides of

13:13

it. This is Jen Shore. She

13:16

worked with Jeff as animal care

13:18

staff in Oregon, a trainer basically,

13:20

and was part of the foundation

13:22

team that moved with Keko to

13:24

Iceland. Little did we realize. Every

13:26

wind comes in the bay and

13:28

turns into a vortex, basically using

13:31

the 600 foot cliffs on three

13:33

sides. Jen and the rest of

13:35

the staff learned the hard truth

13:37

about the weather a couple of

13:39

weeks after Keko's arrival, when a

13:41

storm came through featuring insanely high

13:43

winds, destroying an expensive piece of

13:46

Keko's medical equipment. Pretty soon it

13:48

was clear there would be far

13:50

more of those windy days than

13:52

the calm ones. There's video of

13:54

someone trying to feed Keko during

13:56

one of these wind storms. It's

14:02

like those weather channel shots where

14:04

they send an anchor to stand

14:06

outside in a hurricane. Only in

14:08

this case the staff aren't just

14:11

standing still. They're trying to scoop

14:13

fish out of a trunk with

14:15

a net while the wind blows

14:17

the rain and the sea spray

14:19

horizontally. For a certain kind of

14:21

adventurous young person, working with Keko

14:23

was nothing less than a dream

14:25

job. The pay was good and

14:27

for every month they were in

14:29

Iceland, they had a month off

14:31

to travel. The project had the

14:34

equipment and infrastructure too. Jet skis,

14:36

boats of various sizes, even a

14:38

little office built onto the bay

14:40

pen, which the staff called the

14:42

research shack. It was pretty deluxe,

14:44

complete with electricity, running water and

14:46

an internet connection. From here they

14:48

could monitor Kago's behavior, his swimming

14:50

speed, the depths of his dives,

14:52

from a bank of 19 screens

14:54

showing live video feeds of underwater

14:57

cameras placed all around the pen.

14:59

And there was a hydrophone as

15:01

well, recording the sound beneath the

15:03

surface, his vocalizations, no cost was

15:05

spared. Billionaire Craig McCaw, who was

15:07

footing a huge part of the

15:09

bill for this experiment, happened to

15:11

have an extra helicopter parked on

15:13

his $100 million yacht. So he

15:15

lent it, along with a pilot,

15:17

to the Keko project. This way

15:19

they could more easily keep tabs

15:22

on the wild killer whale pods

15:24

that came through the area. The

15:26

more they learned, the more likely

15:28

they were to find Keko's family.

15:30

And finding them, most people on

15:32

the project agreed, would greatly increase

15:34

the likelihood of a successful return

15:36

to the wild for Keiko. After

15:38

all, lone killer whales in the

15:40

wild are a really rare occurrence.

15:42

Without the help of a pod,

15:45

whether his own or an adopted

15:47

one, Keko would have little chance

15:49

of survival. So that's the state

15:51

of things in the fall of

15:53

1998. Keko back in his home

15:55

waters with a human support team

15:57

befitting a global celebrity. My Money

15:59

and people and equipment all deployed

16:01

to give him the opportunity to

16:03

meet wild whales. Keko had been

16:05

rescued from Mexico, rehabbed in Oregon,

16:07

and now in Iceland it was

16:10

all about release, which meant even

16:12

more rigorous training toward the ultimate

16:14

goal, becoming wild. But before they

16:16

could get closer to the release

16:18

part of the plan, they had

16:20

to get Keko comfortable just being

16:22

in open water. Jen Shore and

16:24

some of the other trainers suspected

16:26

that if they lifted the gates

16:28

of Keko's pen and invited him

16:30

to explore the wider ocean, he'd

16:33

politely declined the invitation. This was

16:35

the immediate problem they needed to

16:37

solve. How to get a whale

16:39

who was uninterested in freedom to

16:41

be more interested in it. You

16:43

can't really make a killer whale

16:45

do anything. I mean, I think

16:47

the original view was just kind

16:49

of... We're going to see how

16:51

this goes and how he does,

16:53

and we'll be guided by that.

16:56

But about six months later, in

16:58

the spring of 1999, Kako was

17:00

still in his seapen, swimming circles

17:02

in his little gated subdivision of

17:04

the ocean, not much closer to

17:06

being wild than he had been

17:08

in Oregon. The project needed a

17:10

larger team to work with Kako

17:12

around the clock, and one with

17:14

a specific skill set. Jeff suggested

17:16

bringing on a small team of

17:18

animal behaviorists, which included a guy

17:21

named Mark Simmons. It wasn't, at

17:23

least on the face of it,

17:25

a natural fit. In fact, the

17:27

person most surprised by it might

17:29

have been Mark himself. You know,

17:31

the Caco project within the professional

17:33

zoological field was just ridiculous. It

17:35

was a joke. Because it was

17:37

unrealistic and expensive, because it was

17:39

seen as closer to activism than

17:41

to science. The project, Market assumed,

17:44

was too radical in its mission

17:46

to have anything to do with

17:48

someone of his background. You know

17:50

this this was the quintessential animal

17:52

rights contingent that was you know

17:54

set on freeing every whale sea

17:56

world had to be clear the

17:58

free Kayco Foundation was for now

18:00

only set on freeing one whale,

18:02

Kayco, though they did hope he

18:04

might serve as a test case

18:06

for others. Mark, though, came from

18:09

a different perspective. He was 30

18:11

years old and had spent a

18:13

decade working at SeaWorld in Orlando

18:15

in what most people call the

18:17

captive industry. Mark bristles at that

18:19

term calls it instead the professional

18:21

zoological field, and for him it's

18:23

an important distinction. Mark thinks places

18:25

like SeaWorld are helping preserve species

18:27

that might otherwise be at risk

18:29

of extinction in the wild. Now

18:32

he was being brought on to

18:34

help Keko get ready for freedom.

18:36

A totally implausible idea as far

18:38

as Mark was concerned. There was

18:40

so much about living in the

18:42

ocean that this whale had never

18:44

had the opportunity to learn. The

18:46

language of his pod, how to

18:48

hunt for starters. It wasn't even

18:50

accurate to call this project a

18:52

re-wilding. This was not an animal

18:54

that had anything to recall. This

18:57

was an animal that had never

18:59

effectively been in the wild, and

19:01

so he'd been in the care

19:03

of man, and I knew that

19:05

to prepare him for the wild,

19:07

he had to forget everything he

19:09

knew. He had to show avoidance

19:11

of humans. He had to learn

19:13

many new skills, and most importantly,

19:15

he had to integrate with wild

19:17

whales, something none of us had

19:20

any control over. So... But there

19:22

must have been something about it

19:24

that excited you. Oh, yeah. I

19:26

mean, you did it. You know,

19:28

back then... SeaWorld was really, I

19:30

often call it sort of the

19:32

Harvard of the marine zoological environment,

19:34

especially when it came to animal

19:36

training, SeaWorld sort of pioneered the

19:38

scientific approach, the methodical approach to

19:40

behavioral modification. And I learned through

19:43

that. So, you know, I was

19:45

pretty confident, I was also at

19:47

that age where, you know, right

19:49

at 30, where you've got some

19:51

experience. But you're also young enough

19:53

to be really bold and of

19:55

course You're either give me the

19:57

ball coach kind of person or

19:59

not and I wanted the ball

20:01

Mark got to work right away

20:03

He and his colleague Robin Fry

20:05

had come to Iceland armed with

20:08

a plan, outlining the training methods

20:10

and protocols to be followed for

20:12

Keko's possible reintroduction. They built their

20:14

proposal based on an approach which

20:16

will be familiar to any college

20:18

psych major, behavioral modification. Some of

20:20

the same principles incidentally that they

20:22

would have used at SeaWorld to

20:24

teach an orca new behaviors, or

20:26

in Keko's case, reshape previously learned

20:28

behaviors. Meaning, you use conditioning and

20:31

rewards like food and attention to

20:33

reinforce certain actions and reduce others.

20:35

Things like being sedentary or watching

20:37

a boat, not good, right? Soliciting

20:39

for attention from a Marine Ops

20:41

guy that was working on the

20:43

bay pen, you know, that's not

20:45

good either. You can't have him

20:47

released to the wild and swimming

20:49

up to any old bolt and

20:51

going, hey, what's going on guys?

20:53

The things you want to reduce

20:56

you make sure not to inadvertently

20:58

reinforce those. by coming out at

21:00

the wrong time, by a boat

21:02

driving up, by making sounds with

21:04

food buckets, because that's a precursor

21:06

to reinforcement. There's a million things.

21:08

On the flip side of that,

21:10

we have bavers we want to

21:12

see. We want to see more

21:14

swimming. We want to see more

21:16

independence. We might want to see

21:19

him going after a seagull. We

21:21

might want to see him chasing

21:23

a seal that happened into the

21:25

bay. You can directly influence those

21:27

by reinforcing them. Certain behaviors among

21:29

the staff had to be eliminated

21:31

too. To prepare Keko for the

21:33

wild, Mark wanted to cut down

21:35

how much human contact Keko received,

21:37

so he laid down some ground

21:39

rules. For starters, the only people

21:42

allowed to interact with Keko would

21:44

be the behavioral team. Everyone else

21:46

had to keep their distance. That

21:48

meant the researchers and the operations

21:50

staff were not allowed at the

21:52

C-pen. No more random visits from

21:54

members of the Foundation Board either.

21:56

None of that. For Jen, who

21:58

had been with Keko since Oregon

22:00

and had dropped everything to follow

22:02

him, to Iceland, this new way

22:04

of doing things required an adjustment.

22:07

It was difficult, to say the

22:09

least. After Mark and Robin got

22:11

there, he weren't allowed to really

22:13

touch him anymore. I mean, he

22:15

would come over to where we

22:17

were working with him from and

22:19

solicit scratches and, you know, we're

22:21

like, sorry, can't do that anymore.

22:23

And it was just frustrating. That

22:27

was really hard to do to

22:29

him because I will tell you

22:31

You'd have to be a sociopath

22:33

not to be emotionally impacted by

22:35

that it was hard And from

22:37

Kako's standpoint he didn't understand any

22:39

of this we couldn't speak in

22:41

English. We couldn't show him the

22:43

permit and have him read what

22:45

was going on All he'd ever

22:47

known was this human foster family

22:49

and had been very loving and

22:52

great and he was into it

22:54

man and What we are doing

22:56

made no sense. Did that give

22:58

you pause? I mean, like, you

23:00

know, it sounds like what you're

23:02

saying is almost an argument for

23:04

like not doing this. Yeah, it

23:06

gave me pause. And yet you

23:08

were part of it. I mean,

23:10

you did it. And you were

23:12

following the program that you and

23:14

Robin... That I created, right? But

23:17

we also believed there was a

23:19

measure of possibility that maybe he

23:21

would beat the odds. When

23:23

you watch video from this time, what's

23:25

clear is just how hard Mark is

23:28

pushing Keko. There's nothing playful about this

23:30

routine, nothing relaxed. I mean, if life

23:32

in Mexico was spring break and Oregon

23:35

was a workout with a personal trainer,

23:37

then Iceland, well, Iceland was boot camp.

23:39

Okay, we're getting ready to do a

23:42

full routine exercise. There's seven behaviors in

23:44

there. It starts with a fast one

23:46

to the right. and we'll go through

23:49

the behaviors that we've done already in

23:51

the criteria and we're going to stick

23:53

to that. Now in the last few

23:55

days we've been pushing him to do

23:58

three to four consecutively correct and two

24:00

criteria behaviors on the first SD. By

24:02

February 2000 a year and a half

24:05

after Keko's arrival in Iceland and 10

24:07

months after Mark had first come there

24:09

was progress. Keko was more independent and

24:12

active in better shape than he'd ever

24:14

been. He was paying less attention to

24:16

boats was doing more exercise than ever,

24:19

spending nearly two-thirds of his free time

24:21

swimming. The progress was dramatic and clear

24:23

enough for Mark and the other trainers

24:26

to decide, yeah, he's ready to leave

24:28

his pen. Kako had already

24:30

had a chance to leave his pen

24:32

about six months earlier when a storm broke

24:35

it open, but he hadn't taken it. Like

24:37

a good boy, he'd stayed put. This

24:39

time, his trainers hoped, would be different. They

24:41

were determined to coax him out. They'd even

24:43

had time to prepare, building a net

24:45

across the mouth of the bay, essentially making

24:48

the entirety of the cove Kako's very

24:50

own protected space. exponentially larger than any pen

24:52

he'd ever known. And as usual, the media

24:54

was on hand to speculate breathlessly about

24:56

what he might do. You, when we see

24:59

Keko out into greater expanse now, is it

25:01

kind of like seeing a freed prisoner?

25:03

We don't know what he's going to do?

25:05

That's the thing. I don't think anybody

25:07

really knows what this way else is going

25:09

to do, and that's a great analogy. It

25:12

is like being in prison. When humans

25:14

are let out of prison, some are let

25:16

out of prison, some are comfortable in prison,

25:18

some are comfortable in that prison. In

25:23

this case, Keko had to be lured out

25:25

by his trainers, one inside the pen and

25:27

one standing on a platform just outside it,

25:29

slapping the water. It took a while, but

25:31

finally Keko did what they were asking. He

25:34

swam through the gate and out of the

25:36

pen. Once there, and with the entire bay

25:38

at his disposal, Keko, well, he didn't do

25:40

too much exploring. He swam briefly out into

25:42

the cove, did a dive, and then headed

25:45

back into his pen. So nothing like the

25:47

whale he played in free will, he played

25:49

in free willy. His reaction to this quasi-freedom

25:51

was more like McFly or the dude. It

25:53

was Keko just hanging out wondering like, uh,

25:56

what the hell am I supposed to do

25:58

with all this water? But

26:00

over time with reinforcement Keko became more interested

26:02

in leaving the pen and learned to appreciate

26:04

life in the bay Pretty soon he was

26:06

spending eight hours a day outside the pen

26:08

of his own accord swimming around exploring When

26:11

he did his trainers would reward his trainers

26:13

would reward him using a slink shot to

26:15

send herring flying all over the bay They

26:17

even had contests among themselves to see who

26:19

could shoot at the farthest Sometimes seagulls would

26:21

get there first and this thought mark was

26:23

a good thing if Keko was going to

26:25

make it in the ocean He'd deal with

26:27

a deal with a little competition with a

26:29

little competition Once

26:32

Keko was used to the bay,

26:34

his trainers, they pulled off something

26:37

pretty remarkable. They had trained Keko

26:39

to ignore all boats except one,

26:41

named dropner. This particular boat would

26:43

be his guide, his walkboat. It

26:45

had a platform on one side

26:48

where the trainers could stand to

26:50

feed Keko and give him instructions.

26:52

The goal was to get Keko

26:54

to follow the dropner out of

26:56

the bay and into the ocean.

27:02

I mean, when we took him

27:04

outside the bay, it was a

27:06

gorgeous day. This is Mark Simmons

27:09

again. He still remembers the first

27:11

time they took Kako way out

27:13

into the open ocean for a

27:15

walk. And the current around the

27:18

island is such that right outside

27:20

the mouth of the bay is

27:22

where it's the choppiest. So the

27:24

swells were bigger than the dropner,

27:27

you know. And we'd go up

27:29

one swell down another and he

27:31

immediately started riding down the swells

27:33

with his flukes kind of tipped

27:35

up like a sail like a

27:38

sail. and just and the water

27:40

was just gin clear and it

27:42

was amazing. I mean my my

27:44

heart was in my throat everybody

27:47

was just like oh my god

27:49

look at him you know it

27:51

was so much fun he was

27:53

like a little kid. regimen. He

27:56

might swim 11 nautical miles a

27:58

day in the open ocean alongside

28:00

the dropner. He was diving more,

28:02

eating the live fish, he was

28:05

fed, including fish that had not

28:07

been stunned. The underweight weakling that

28:09

had arrived in Oregon was no

28:11

more. This was Keko, unrecognizable, even

28:14

to Mark. There was a point

28:16

at which my wife came up

28:18

to visit, and she was still

28:20

a trainer at SeaWorld, so she

28:23

had been working with the whales

28:25

there. She came out on the

28:27

walk, but, and I'll never forget,

28:29

she really thought he had the

28:31

disposition and demeanor of a wild

28:34

killer whale. And to me, that

28:36

was groundbreaking. I didn't see that

28:38

much change. I knew it changed,

28:40

but maybe not that much change.

28:43

And here's this big marshmallow angel

28:45

of an animal and my wife's

28:47

telling me, he looks like a

28:49

wild whale. And to me, that

28:52

was a great success. That was

28:54

affirmation. I think it was the

28:56

first time that I thought, holy

28:58

crap, we might actually pull this

29:01

off. They might. They actually might.

29:03

That's after the break. You

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fries? You wake up dreaming of

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McDonald's hash browns. McDonald's breakfast comes

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first. What's my subscription to the

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this week, preparing a strawberry pretzel

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one of the 52 best places

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of the big pants trend. Whoa!

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And I'm finally replacing my vacuum

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with the recommendation I can trust.

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What will your subscription to the

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go to mytimes.com/subscribe. All the behavior

29:46

modification, the boat walks, the training.

29:48

It was all leading up to

29:50

one very important day. in June

29:52

of 2000, when Keko would be

29:54

reintroduced to wild killer whales. The

29:56

last orchus Keko had met had

29:58

been in Canada at marine land

30:00

when he was just four or

30:02

five years old, and it hadn't

30:04

gone well. Keko was frightened and

30:06

bullied by these older, bigger killer

30:08

whales and had arrived in Mexico

30:11

traumatized by the experience. That was

30:13

his history. And in the years

30:15

since he'd been habituated to humans,

30:17

and with the brief exception of

30:19

his dolphin friends at Reinoaventura, only

30:21

humans. In Mark's mind, this history

30:23

was all the more reason to

30:25

go slow. They were thinking that

30:27

Kako's first introduction to wild whales

30:29

would be more of a baby

30:31

step than a grand reunion. We

30:33

wanted this to be a passive

30:35

experiment, where Kako was within sight

30:38

or hearing range of the wild

30:40

whales. We expected it to be

30:42

very, very benign, a very boring

30:44

introduction. They had planned and discussed

30:46

and negotiated this introduction with each

30:48

other for weeks in meticulous detail.

30:50

We would take him out into

30:52

the path of the wild whales,

30:54

you know, far in advance of

30:56

the wild whales a mile or

30:58

more, and we would go neutral

31:00

and be silent in the water.

31:02

We would pull up the platform,

31:05

letting Keko know, leave the boat,

31:07

you know, that he's not going

31:09

to get attention from us, and

31:11

we would go silent, and we

31:13

would just let happen what was

31:15

going to happen. Whether he would

31:17

see them, hear them, whether they

31:19

would be curious, whether they would

31:21

come by or swim away, we

31:23

didn't know. But that was it.

31:25

That was it. Tom Sanders, another

31:27

trainer on the project, remembers it

31:29

similarly. You know, we wanted them

31:31

to just kind of see him

31:34

for who he was, you know,

31:36

let him communicate, possibly echo the

31:38

okay through the water, whatever. We

31:40

weren't sure what was going to

31:42

happen, to be honest. We just

31:44

kind of wanted to try to

31:46

give him every chance he could

31:48

make to make it work for

31:50

him. In other words, they'd follow

31:52

Keko's lead and keep it nice

31:54

and easy and quiet. finally arrives.

31:56

Everyone's got their assignments. Mark's on

31:58

the walkboat, standing on a platform

32:01

where he can keep tabs on

32:03

Keko, who's swimming alongside. Jeff Foster,

32:05

he's up in a helicopter, tasked

32:07

with watching from above. And then

32:09

there's Tom. His boat leaves early

32:11

that morning, hoping to find a

32:13

suitable pod of wild whales for

32:15

Keko to meet. He's not the

32:17

only one on this boat. The

32:19

driver was a guy, he was

32:21

a local man, his name is

32:23

Sity, and then Dr. Lanny Cornell

32:25

Cornell, the vet. Lanny Cornell, Keko's

32:28

veterinarian, one of the people calling

32:30

the shots that day. Eventually, Lanny

32:32

and Tom spot some wild whales.

32:34

When we got close, we could

32:36

see the pod, we had binoculars

32:38

and things like that, we could

32:40

see the wild pod did have

32:42

young with it, only a few

32:44

months old if I had a

32:46

guess. They were still yellowish in

32:48

color, which signals that they're younger,

32:50

and they were small. We knew

32:52

it wasn't ideal that they had

32:54

whales with them, basically. because we

32:57

just knew that they'd be more

32:59

protective and not necessarily wanting some

33:01

big mailable to show up in

33:03

their midst. But if anyone had

33:05

any hesitations about Keko meeting this

33:07

pod with calves, Tom says they

33:09

weren't discussed on his boat. It's

33:11

like, well, how many chances of

33:13

this are we're going to get,

33:15

you know? So let's just stick

33:17

with the plan, turn the motors

33:19

off, chill out, and just float.

33:21

But that's not what happened. boat

33:24

driver to go ahead and kill

33:26

our engine. And Lanny immediately was

33:28

like, no, get closer. And I

33:30

was like, what are you talking

33:32

about? That was the whole point

33:34

was to not get close to

33:36

this wild pond with a running

33:38

boat. So 50, I feel really

33:40

bad to this day for that

33:42

guy because he's got me basically

33:44

saying, turn the engine off as

33:46

we planned. But then he's got

33:48

this guy that's like, has cloud.

33:50

To not do it then we

33:53

have to get closer because this

33:55

is for research and important, you

33:57

know, we have to document this

33:59

whole thing Lani was Keko's lead vet,

34:01

but he didn't live in Iceland with

34:03

the rest of the team. He just

34:05

flew in from California occasionally. Because of

34:07

this, some people felt Lani didn't actually

34:09

know Keko, at least not as well

34:12

as they did. Lani didn't want to

34:14

talk to us for this story, so

34:16

I can't say how well he felt

34:18

he understood Keko. But as the lead

34:20

vet, he had a lot of power

34:22

on the Keko project. And according to

34:24

Tom and several others we talked to,

34:26

for Lenny, this day wasn't just an

34:29

introduction to Wild Wales. It was a

34:31

farewell to Keko. From what I remember,

34:33

he kind of was like talking like

34:35

it was happening that day, like to

34:37

release. He was going to swim off

34:39

into the sunset with his love that day.

34:42

To be fair, it wasn't only Lanny

34:44

who held out hope for this.

34:46

To some extent, the entire project

34:48

was built around a shared desire

34:50

for this very outcome. Here's Charles

34:52

Vinick who managed the

34:55

project at the time. You know,

34:57

I think the assumption going

34:59

in was that this would not

35:01

be along an extended

35:03

period. This would be something

35:06

that when Keko had the

35:08

opportunity to meet Wild Wales,

35:10

he would join them readily

35:13

or join a pod readily

35:15

and they would accept him

35:17

readily. I imagine that

35:20

everyone that day wanted to believe this was

35:22

at least possible. I mean, how tempting must

35:24

it have been to just find out? Like,

35:26

let's just see what happens if we get

35:28

a little closer. So, we got closer and

35:30

closer, and we got to where we were

35:32

basically in the pod at this point. The

35:34

next thing Tom knows, the wild whales

35:36

have disappeared underwater, and he's not

35:39

sure which direction they've gone in. At the

35:41

same time, back on the walkboat, the one

35:43

Kakoo is near, with Mark watching. They believe

35:45

the wild whales are actually moving away from

35:47

them, so they move a bit closer. And

35:50

all of a sudden... It's chaos. The wild

35:52

whales and Keko were way too close to

35:54

each other, thrashing and splashing in the water.

35:57

Here's Mark again. We don't know where the

35:59

wild whales are. Kako sunk explicitly letting

36:01

go of a lot of air.

36:03

If you ever seen a whale

36:06

do this, they'll just blow all

36:08

their air and go down and

36:10

it's enough to rock a good-sized

36:13

boat. And so there was a

36:15

bubble's coming from everywhere. It was

36:17

an absolute cluster fuck of epic

36:20

proportions. Tracy Carmuzo was one of

36:22

the trainers on the walkboat with

36:25

Mark. And all of a sudden,

36:27

this boat was here and the

36:29

whales were there and it was

36:32

just this... And who knows what

36:34

happened underwater? From the helicopter, Jeff

36:36

could see what had happened. Kako

36:39

had split. I could just about

36:41

see how big his eyes were

36:43

when he started porpoising them across

36:46

the water and trying to get

36:48

out of there. It just was

36:50

a disaster. And when Kako went

36:53

one direction and the whales went

36:55

the other, and he just was

36:57

gone. Gone. Yes, they had a

37:00

tracker on him. Unfortunately, it only

37:02

worked if Kako was close enough

37:04

to pick up a signal. and

37:07

he was way out of range.

37:09

Just like that, the world's most

37:11

famous whale was gone. So what

37:14

now? It depended on how you

37:16

interpreted what had just happened. Maybe

37:18

the boats corraled Keko and the

37:21

whales too close to each other

37:23

and Keko responded to a chaotic

37:25

situation swimming away out of fear.

37:28

Or maybe you believe that by

37:30

swimming away Keko had made his

37:32

choice. Wildness. Which would be a

37:35

thrilling prospect, of course. Project manager

37:37

Charles Vinick told me Lanny Cornell

37:40

was so convinced of this, he

37:42

even called some of the board

37:44

members to share the news. Called

37:47

board members and said things to

37:49

anyone really well and Keko is

37:51

on his own and this is,

37:54

you know, we should declare victory

37:56

and this is where we are.

37:58

I don't think his words were

38:01

declared victory, but his words were

38:03

that, you know, Keko has gone.

38:05

But... I think it felt premature

38:08

to almost everyone. No, he's not.

38:10

He's not with Wales. This is...

38:12

Tracy again. He's not, again, he's

38:15

not blowing rainbows and going off.

38:17

You know, it's, I was like,

38:19

no, that, he's traumatized. And so

38:22

a search party, including a boat

38:24

and a helicopter goes off to

38:26

find Keko. Mark and a few

38:29

others spend hours looking. The radio

38:31

transmitter on Keko's dorsal fin pings

38:33

when you get close enough and

38:36

eventually their antenna picks up a

38:38

signal. When he surfaces, they see

38:40

the cake of his alone, not

38:43

with wild whales, just alone and

38:45

in terrible shape. His eyes were

38:47

just bugged out of his head.

38:50

I have never, never before and

38:52

never since seen a killer whale's

38:54

eyes that big. And he didn't

38:57

look like, he just did not

38:59

look like himself. He looked, it's

39:02

impossible to know the cognitive state

39:04

of an animal, they can't talk

39:06

to you. But if I didn't

39:09

know better, I would say he

39:11

was just so wigged out he

39:13

was incoherent. Which is a kind

39:16

of wellness, sure, just not the

39:18

kind anyone had hoped for, and

39:20

probably not the kind of wellness

39:23

that would help Keko much at

39:25

all. I was furious. I was

39:27

furious because I could see what

39:30

we had done, had done precisely.

39:32

what every protocol we had outlined

39:34

set out to avoid. We had

39:37

made it an absolutely traumatic learning

39:39

event. And, you know, memory, memory

39:41

gets recorded in the nervous system.

39:44

So we couldn't have done a

39:46

better job at upending the entire

39:48

reintroduction protocol and process that we

39:51

had spent 10 months building up

39:53

to building up to. Mark

39:57

and his crew try to get

39:59

Keko to follow the boat back

40:01

to the... pen, but every time

40:03

they move he falls behind. By

40:05

this point it's nighttime, or at

40:07

least that summer half-light that passes

40:09

for night in Iceland. Keko, seemingly

40:11

exhausted from swimming so far, so

40:13

fast, can't keep up. No matter

40:15

how slow they go, no matter

40:17

how many breaks they give him.

40:19

So finally, they give up for

40:21

the night. We all just kind

40:23

of found a place on the

40:25

boat and we're going to catch

40:27

some shut-eye and give Keko a

40:29

chance to rest, and we could

40:31

hear his breathing, his breathing near

40:33

the boat, and I don't remember

40:35

how long we stayed like that,

40:37

as long as we felt comfortable,

40:39

I think, for a few hours,

40:41

maybe. Eventually, they start up again

40:43

and slowly make it back to

40:45

the bay pen to rest. For

40:47

Mark, Robin, and Tom, that was

40:49

essentially that, the end of their

40:51

association with the project. They saw

40:53

Kako as traumatized by the botched

40:55

introduction. He'd been pushed too far

40:57

too fast and to stay would

40:59

have meant being okay with more

41:01

encounters no matter the cost of

41:03

Keko. And so within a few

41:05

weeks they were on flights back

41:07

to the US. But there was

41:09

another way to look at all

41:11

this. Being too protective would do

41:13

Keko no favors. He was never

41:15

going to make it unless he

41:17

was pushed. And those who chose

41:19

to stay in Iceland were going

41:21

to have to be okay with

41:24

pushing him. That's

41:26

on the next episode of The

41:28

Good Whale. Us training him to

41:30

be a wild killer whale is

41:32

a little ludicrous. He would be

41:35

trained, but not by us, by

41:37

the other whale. But at some

41:39

moments I was wondering how much,

41:41

when is too much, how much

41:44

this whale suffered. You know, I

41:46

didn't sign on board to watch

41:48

his handle star of death. Sign

41:54

up for our newsletter where

41:57

this week you can see

41:59

photos of Kako's bay pen

42:01

and it's stunning dramatic location

42:03

in Iceland. Go to nytimes.com/serial

42:05

newsletter. The Goodwill is written

42:07

by me Daniel Alarkon and

42:10

reported by me and Katie

42:12

Mingle. The show is produced

42:14

by Katie and Alyssa Ship.

42:16

Gen Guerra is our editor,

42:18

additional editing from Julie Snyder

42:21

and Ira Glass. Sound design,

42:23

music supervision and mixing by

42:25

Phoebe Wang. The original score

42:27

for the Goodwill comes from

42:29

La Chica and Osman. Our

42:31

theme music is by Nick

42:34

Thorburn and additional music from

42:36

Matt McGinley. Research and fact-checking

42:38

by Jane Ackerman with help

42:40

from Ben Phelan. Tracking direction

42:42

by Elna Baker. Susan Westling

42:44

is our standards editor. Legal

42:47

review from Alameen Sumar and

42:49

Simone Procus. Carles Lopez Estrada

42:51

is a contributing editor on

42:53

the series. The supervising producer

42:55

for serial productions is Andé

42:57

Chubu. Mac Miller is the

43:00

executive assistant for serial. Liz

43:02

Davis Moore is the senior

43:04

operations manager. Special thanks this

43:06

week to Anna Marcival Klausen,

43:08

Catherine Henley, Michael Parks, Robin

43:10

Baird, Howard Garrett, Craig McCaw,

43:13

Kelly Reed, Jim Horton, and

43:15

Greg Shore. The Goodwill is

43:17

from serial productions in the

43:19

New York Times. But it

43:21

won't be free forever. So

43:23

if you want full access

43:26

to this show and to

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all serial shows, you've got

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to be a New York

43:32

Times subscriber. Learn more about

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the New York Times audio

43:36

subscription at nytimes.com/ podcasts.