How the sinking of a fishing boat in endangered orcas’ waters sent up a bright warning flare

Part 1 of two parts

FRIDAY HARBOR, Washington—As a pair of transient male orcas cruised northward up the western side of San Juan Island on Sunday, it became apparent that they were headed straight toward the large platform with a crane that had just the day before pulled up a large fishing boat, the Aleutian Isle, which had gone down into 200 feet of water a month before, spilling diesel into the surrounding waters. So a couple of boats got in their path.

The boats were part of a special Coast Guard response team that had been drilling in the vicinity in the weeks after the spill, equipped with oikomi pipes, underwater bells that set up a noise to repel cetaceans like the two male transients. And their efforts Sunday seemed to work, but perhaps not quite as intended: Instead of going farther out into Haro Strait, the mammal-eating Bigg’s orcas instead diverted their path in closer to shore passing inside of Low Island just off County Park, frightening the row of harbor seals who had secured themselves on the rocky haulout.