Activists are fighting to bring Lolita the orca home.
The killer whale, also known as “Tokitae,” was captured off Whidbey Island in 1970. She now resides at the Miami Seaquarium.
A group rallied on the Seattle waterfront Saturday. Fifteen similar gatherings were held around the world.
Robin Lee Noll, and her daughter, Julie Annie, drove up from California for the event. Noll witnessed the aftermath of Lolita’s capture as a child, growing up on Penn Cove.
“What I saw was after the hunters left, and took the orcas away,” she said. “I saw all the dead orcas on the beach, and it was heartbreaking.”
She described how her mother would take her to watch the whales swim. She was so struck by the capture that she began a letter-writing campaign.
“Pretty soon kids from all over Whidbey Island were writing letters,” she said. “Then one day Senator Warren Magnuson called me, and said, ‘I have your letter on my desk, and you feel strongly about these whales…’”
Noll’s movement eventually led to greater protections for the whales. Her daughter is now the same age and gathering signatures to support Lolita’s retirement.
“It’s not right to put animals or people in captivity,” said Julie. “I want her to retire.”
Noll expressed frustrated at Lolita's conditions in captivity.
"She's 21 feet long, and the tank is 20 feet deep," she said. "It's tiny. It's like if someone took your from your mom when you were four and put you in a bathtub."
Orca Network has a retirement plan in place to bring Lolita from Florida to Washington, where she’d be introduced to a netted seapen in her native waters. Eventually, they hope she could be rehabilitated to rejoin her family, L pod of southern resident orcas.
“We’re going to make this happen,” said Warren Garrett of Orca Network.
Miami Seaquarium has so far not agreed to the plan.
Robin said her daughter feels a connection to Lolita, more than most – Julie was adopted out of foster care.
“She really on a deep compassionate level understands what it’s like to be taken from your family and put with strangers you don’t know, and be waiting to be with a forever family that you’re meant to be with,” Noll said.
