Heading off the grid on a reporting trip, so no more blog action until mid-June.
Be good….
Author: timzimmermann
What Does SeaWorld President Jim Atchison’s E-mail Say About SeaWorld’s Plans?
Wow, that was fast. The trainer comment on the OSHA ruling I just posted made mention of an e-mail to employees from SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment President and CEO Jim Atchison. And, poof, someone sent me an e-mail to employees from Jim Atchison.
This is not the original e-mail in response to Judge Welsch’s OSHA ruling, mentioned by the current trainer in the previous post, but apparently a follow-up e-mail Atchison sent employees regarding news coverage of the OSHA ruling. If the tone of the original e-mail was similar, you can see why some employees might have got the impression that the OSHA ruling was favorable to SeaWorld. (Side question: Was Atchison simply counting on them not to read Judge Welsch’s decision, or believe the news coverage because he says different?]
As I wrote at Outside Online, Judge Welsch’s decision could sharply limit SeaWorld’s famed Shamu Show by preventing SeaWorld from returning to its most famous show practice: swimming and performing in the water with its killer whales, or waterwork. The decision also limits drywork contact with Tilikum, who was always subject to a waterwork ban due to his involvement in previous deaths, but was a popular star in side shows, such as the Dine With Shamu show which got Brancheau killed. And it similarly restricts close contact with the rest of SeaWorld Florida’s killer whales, even when trainers are on shallow ledges or at poolside, i.e. “drywork.”
But the language of the OSHA citation, which was issued in August 2010, for some reason references “waterwork” and “drywork” performances, as opposed to simply applying to any and all waterwork and drywork killer whale interactions involving close contact. Non-performance waterwork and drywork that occurs during training, exercise and (to an extent) animal care is virtually identical to that which is performed in the shows. And Atchison’s e-mail to SeaWorld employees suggests that SeaWorld may try to exploit that distinction.
Here is the text of Atchison’s internal e-mail (emphasis added):
To: All SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment Team Members
You may have seen news coverage over the last 24 hours concerning a ruling on OSHA’s citations against SeaWorld. While there has been much discussion of the implications of the decision, we view it as a positive that both the citation and the related fine were reduced substantially.
It is important to note that the judge agreed that caring for these animals requires contact between trainers and whales. As the judge indicates in his decision, the ruling applies only to show performances, and not to husbandry, exercise, learning, play and relationship activities.
While we view the overall decision as positive for us, we do disagree with some of the judge’s interpretations. We have every confidence in the safety of our extraordinary killer whale training program. Protecting the safety of our team members is a core commitment for SeaWorld, and our record in this area is exemplary.
The current show already includes many of the safety enhancements noted in the judge’s report. When we introduced the new “One Ocean” killer whale show, we voluntarily incorporated additional safety enhancements, such as barriers and proximity changes, which have now been in place for more than a year.
Our killer whale program is a model for marine zoological facilities around the world, and the additions we have made in the areas of personal safety, facility design and communication have enhanced this program further still. In addition to these existing safety measures, we also continue to progress on the development of prototypes such as a lifting pool floor.
I am extremely proud of the many men and women throughout our company who have represented and assisted us in this matter. They have demonstrated an unwavering dedication to safety, animal welfare and upholding our company’s long-standing reputation for excellence.
Jim Atchison
Apart from the oddity of describing the “overall decision,” which was in essence a denial of the key elements of SeaWorld’s appeal, as “positive for us,” what stands out is Atchison’s language regarding the scope of Welsch’s ruling.
Since Brancheau’s death, and during the lengthy process of appealing the OSHA citation, SeaWorld ceased waterwork at all its parks, and also changed how close trainers could get to killer whales, and how they would interact with them, during drywork (the “barriers” and “proximity changes” that Atchison mentions). But as Atchison notes, Welsch’s decision applies only to performances (following the language of the citation). So SeaWorld could in theory resume waterwork and close contact drywork with its killer whales outside of performances, and be in compliance with Judge Welsch’s decision.
If SeaWorld goes this route, which would help SeaWorld maintain its waterwork training even as it continues to hope to find a way to return waterwork to its shows, there will be risks. While Brancheau was killed while performing with Tilikum, Alexis Martinez was killed by a SeaWorld killer whale at Loro Parque two months earlier during a waterwork training session. So the same risks and dangers to trainers apply regardless of whether there is an audience or not. All that really matters is proximity. And the liability exposure if SeaWorld resumed non-performance waterwork and/or close contact drywork, and another trainer was injured or killed by a killer whale, would presumably be very high.
In addition, OSHA would be very unlikely to stand by if SeaWorld resumed the very practices–albeit not during performances–that OSHA deemed dangerous when it cited SeaWorld Florida in the first place. Les Grove, Area Director of OSHA’s Tampa Area Office, which issued the original citation, addressed this potential performance loophole during the hearings before Judge Welsch, when pressed by SeaWorld’s lawyer on whether the citation applied to non-performance waterwork and drywork, or just performances. Grove said that the citation applied only to performances, and added “But as a responsible employer, if you are aware of other interactions, where they’re exposed to the hazard, you should look at that and take action to materially reduce the hazard.”
In other words, if SeaWorld resumed waterwork and close contact drywork in exercise, play, and relationship-buuilding sessions that take place outside of performances, OSHA would view that as a danger to employees, and would almost certainly conduct a follow-up inspection that could result in another round of citations for endangerment of employees. SeaWorld, of course, could appeal those citations as well, which presumably would mean another lengthy legal proceeding.
It will be interesting to see how this all plays out, and how SeaWorld in the end chooses to address Judge Welsch’s decision. Atchison also mentions safety enhancements, including the fast-lifting pool floor that SeaWorld Florida is prototyping (which in theory could be used to beach a killer whale acting aggressively or attacking a trainer). The OSHA citation says that SeaWorld can abate the dangers cited through safety modifications, as long as the modifications “provide the same or a greater level of portection for the trainers” as avoiding close contact or staying out of the water. That is a very high standard, but SeaWorld has invested millions in developing the lifting pool floor, and has also been working on, and practicing with, personal air supply systems that trainers could wear in the pools. Making those investments doesn’t make much sense if SeaWorld doesn’t have plans to try and put trainers back in the water one way or another.
To close, here’s Atchison discussing SeaWorld’s plans, and press coverage, in the immediate aftermath of Dawn Brancheau’s death, just as the OSHA investigation was about to start. Amazing what a long and winding road has been traveled since then:
OSHA Reaction From A SeaWorld Trainer
Over the weekend I opened my e-mail to find this reaction to Judge Welsch’s OSHA ruling from a current SeaWorld trainer with many years of experience. It has always been clear that some (though not all) trainers have to deal with a number of contradictory feelings about working with orcas in captivity. But I thought this revealed the bitter honesty of at least one person’s mindset, and I wonder how many other trainers think like this:
I read the 47 page ruling and thought his sharp criticism of the culture and upper management was awesome. And to be honest with you, it made me sick to my stomach. I have known these abuses for years but to see it in affirmed in black and white was sickening. I’m a little ashamed that I allowed this company to take advantage of and abuse me (and the whales) for years because of my own selfishness to want these experiences. It reminded me of how an abused person behaves and justifies the actions of their abusers. Even the fact that SeaWorld testified that they had no knowledge that it was dangerous for us to work with the whales. I love that the judge pointed out how ridiculous it was for them to say that. But all of us trainers sat back and allowed them to say such disgusting things because we wanted to swim, we wanted to keep our jobs, etc.
His ruling finally called bullshit on this cult-like atmosphere we live in and ultimately support as killer whale trainers for SeaWorld. Even the spin machine that has begun is mind blowing. Jim Atchison’s email to all employees is unbelievable. Trainers at the killer whale stadium who had not seen the news yet and only had information from his email actually believed we had won! Some trainers found a lot to be concerned about in the ruling, but aren’t getting many answers from upper management. A Curator even said that this doesn’t mean anything and that they would continue on as they have been and continue to progress as they see fit. And some trainers didn’t even want to know any details because they love the job so much they didn’t want to hear bad news. Some are senior people and supervisors, which just shows how incredibly brainwashed many still are.
I’ve long felt that trainers at SeaWorld have to be able to achieve a certain degree of cognitive dissonance to be able to say on the one hand that they love the
killer whales, and on the other hand be witness to the early deaths, the tooth drilling, the sunburnt skin, the social instability and aggression. and all the other chronic effects of captivity. And I have always suspected that many were able to achieve this cognitive dissonance because what killer whale training is really about for them is the sheer exhilaration of experiencing, bonding with, and swimming with, one of the planet’s most extraordinary animals. In other words, it was about the trainers’ fantasies and trainers’ desires–no matter how much spin and PR would try to convince you otherwise–not the needs and well-being of the killer whales in their care.
If Welsch’s ruling stands, perhaps it will be harder to maintain this cognitive dissonance, because the ultimate experience of working with a killer whale–waterwork–could be gone. So maybe the reality will start to trump the fantasy for more trainers. Already I am hearing lots of noise about trainers moving out of various Shamu stadiums, to stadiums such as Whale and Dolphin where there continues to be waterwork. Though I don’t know the motivation or reasons for any trainer movement, I have had some people tell me that work at Shamu Stadium without waterwork can be kind of a grind. So maybe more trainers will seek work away from Shamu Stadium, or even start thinking about moving on from SeaWorld altogether.
One more note: Last Friday I was on the Sam Simon show, which is always an interesting discussion because Simon (follow him on Twitter here) is passionate about the topic of orcas. Former SeaWorld trainer Jeff Ventre, over at Voice Of the Orcas, posted the audio.
Judge Welsch’s Decision
As a follow-up to my Outside post, I want to call out Judge Welsch’s decision, and urge you to read it. I don’t want it to get lost in all the back and forth over SeaWorld and the future of waterwork, and whether SeaWorld can successfully appeal or implement sufficient safety measures to allow trainers back in the water.
It is 47 pages, and in my view a relentless and powerfully argued deconstruction of SeaWorld’s corporate culture, training regime, and safety strategy. And because, for the first time, SeaWorld was compelled to put on the record its personnel and its internal documents, it is one of the most revealing looks inside killer whale captivity that you can read. If you have any interest in this topic you will find it a fascinating document.
Se here it is. Let me know what you think:
Shamu Show Smackdown
Administrative Law Judge Kenneth Welsch released his decision in SeaWorld’s appeal of OSHA’s 2010 citations regarding the safety of SeaWorld’s killer whale program.
It’s a doozy, and I’ve got my take posted over at Outside Online. Here’s the intro:
A decision released yesterday by Administrative Law Judge Kenneth Welsch in Florida will fundamentally change SeaWorld’s killer whale shows. In a landmark case, Judge Welsch ruled in favor of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), concluding that the only way to keep Seaworld trainers safe is to either keep them away from close contact with the killer whales (which means no waterwork in the pools with them during shows), or to use physical barriers or other safety modifications to provide the same level of protection. Unless SeaWorld appeals Welsch’s ruling and manages to win, the Shamu Shows as we know them likely just came to an end.
OSHA’s case was prompted by the death of SeaWorld trainer Dawn Brancheau, who, on February 24, 2010, was pulled into the water and brutally killed by SeaWorld’s largest killer whale, a male called Tilikum who weighs about 12,000 pounds. After Brancheau’s death, OSHA took a hard look at the safety of SeaWorld’s killer whale training methods and high-intensity killer whale shows, which feature trainers swimming with, riding, and leaping off whales. Following a detailed investigation, OSHA hit SeaWorld with a series of safety citations, the most serious of which said SeaWorld knowingly exposed killer whale trainers to being struck or drowned by killer whales when it had them work closely with Tilikum and other killer whales. The only way to abate the dangers, OSHA said, was to either stop working in close contact with the killer whales, or keep physical barriers (or equivalent measures) between trainers and killer whales. In short, OSHA said that SeaWorld’s killer whale program was dangerous and needed radical changes.
SeaWorld hotly contested OSHA’s conclusions, which it called “unfounded,” and launched an appeal. After a series of hearings that took place last fall, Judge Welsch issued his ruling this week. The verdict: OSHA’s conclusions stand. In his decision (available here), Welsch systematically picked apart SeaWorld’s arguments that its training methods, and ability to predict dangerous or aggressive killer whale behavior, are protection enough for trainers.
Welsch reduced the nature of the OSHA’s citation from “willful” (the most severe) to “serious,” and reduced Seaworld’s fine for the critical citation from $70,000 to $7,000. Then he set about sytematically dismantling SeaWorld’s arguments. Read the whole thing…
Bonus: Here’s a video, shot by a Shamu Stadium audience member, which shows SeaWorld raising the fast-rising floor in the Orlando G Pool. This floor design is one of the innovations that SeaWorld is developing, and could be used to try and convince OSHA that it is safe to put trainers back in the water. The challenge is that such measures have to provide an equal or better level of protection for trainers than simply keeping them away from close contact with killer whales. And that’s a pretty hard case to make.
Whale vs. Volvo 70
This video brings together two things I care about–whales and the Volvo Ocean Race–and luckily neither party was injured. The video shows the New Zealand team, CAMPER, dodging a whale at more than 20 knots.
From the Volvo Ocean Race website:
White water was breaking over the red boat’s bow as the team hurtled at speeds in excess of 20 knots when Bermúdez’s keen eye caught a grey glimpse of the mammal off the bow.
Without a second thought Bermúdez swung the wheel and dodged the whale, avoiding a collision that could have proved costly for the boat and crew.
“With reflexes like a cat he narrowly missed what could have been the equivalent of a runaway freight train colliding with a truck,” Media Crew Member Hamish Hooper said.
“We were doing just over 20 knots and all of a sudden the boat lurched to starboard, just staying in control.
“Nico (skipper Chris Nicholson) popped his head up to see Chuny looking as if he has just seen his life flash before his eyes. I think he had. It would have been seriously bad for both the whale and us.”
As sailboat technology has delivered lighter, more powerful boats that can travel across the seas at ridiculous speeds, collision with anything is increasingly a problem. And collision with a whale at those speeds is a life-threatening problem–both for the crew (which would experience the equivalent of hitting a soft wall at almost 30 miles per hour, which can easily sink a boat, cause head injuries, or pitch crew overboard) and the whale (which would experience a potentially fatal blow from either a sharp bow or keel).
Many race boats have hit whales (here and here, for example), leaving clouds of blood in the water, and usually all the focus is on whether the boat and crew is okay. No one ever really knows (or cares that much) what happens to the whale, but it is reasonable to assume sailboat racing has killed a number of whales (and so far the score is entirely in favor of the humans–no sailor that I now of has died as a result of collision with a whale, though rescues have been required when boats were destroyed).
Side note: of course, every once in a while the whales get their own licks in:
At some level sailboat racing is a pretty frivolous human endeavor, so the death of a whale is pretty hard to justify. Sadly, there does not yet seem to be any real solution to the problem of high-speed sailboats colliding with whales. So add the occasional dead whale (or shark, or sunfish, or….) to the list of things that modern sailboat racing involves.
Must Read: “The Ocean Of Life”
If you want to know pretty much everything on how humanity has exploited and damaged the oceans, since the first humanoid fashioned a crude fish spear or fish hook, then Callum Roberts’ new book “The Ocean Of Life” should be next on your book pile.
Here’s a review in the Wall Street Journal, by my friend Bruce Knecht, who, after an introductory quibble, writes:
Having made this point, I need to now jump up and down myself to say that “Ocean of Life” is an excellent and engrossing work. Mr. Roberts, a British professor of marine conservation, has corralled an astonishing collection of scientific discovery, and he conveys it with non-textbook readability.
It must also be said that the unvarnished realities of what has happened to marine life should outrage everyone. Many of the statistics are not new. In the past 30 years, the populations of the largest marine animals have declined by 75%. Some species have been depleted by more than 90%. Other populations are not even counted anymore because they have disappeared entirely. One of the species that now appears to be on a fast track to extinction is the leatherback turtle, the massive reptile that has existed since the time of the dinosaurs. “There is just one leatherback left in the Pacific for every twenty in 1962, the year I was born,” Mr. Roberts writes. [snip]…
…The steady undercurrent to most of this is bad news, and it leads to a disturbing and seemingly inevitable conclusion: The explosion of human populations, our disrespect for ecosystems, and our ever-expanding demand for seafood and everything else will exceed the natural world’s capacities and ultimately put humankind’s survival at risk. Mr. Roberts reminds us that, during the Earth’s more than four-billion-year history, there have been at least five mass extinctions, including an episode of global warming 65 million years ago that killed off the dinosaurs. He believes that we are likely to be heading toward a sixth such catastrophe. This one would differ dramatically from the others both because those who caused it—us—would also be victims, and because the disaster might be avoidable. Mr. Roberts is particularly worried about the possibility of another bout of global warming.
While some say it is not absolutely clear that the current warming trend is a real threat or that it is man-caused, there can be no such doubt about the destruction of ocean life. The traditional belief that the seas are so large as to be impervious to human effects is long gone. The specific problems are mostly familiar: industrial pollution and fertilizer runoffs, the destruction of wetlands and river deltas, rising sea temperatures, and of course too much fishing. Technological advancements have made it possible to scoop up fish far faster than they can reproduce. “Our planetary remodeling did not stop at the shore,” Mr. Roberts writes. “It just came a little later to the sea.”
Okay, so it’s not a very uplifting read, but what did you expect? These are hard times for the oceans. And to the extent the book delivers such a dire prognosis, it is a very helpful reminder that the scale of mitigation we tend to talk about when we talk about addressing climate change and the fate of the oceans is completely inconsistent with the scale of the problem.
We need to amp it up by a couple of orders of magnitude, folks, when it comes to changing the way we live and changing our economies. So thanks, Mr. Roberts, for helping make that clear because so far not that many people seem to be paying attention.
SeaWorld’s Takara No Longer Considered Pregnant
At the risk of over-exciting all my skeptics, who think I pull SeaWorld orca pregnancies out of my ass, I have been getting word that SeaWorld Texas’ Takara is not pregnant. Takara was one of a number of SeaWorld pregnancies that I wrote about last November. All seemed normal, and SeaWorld considered Takara to be pregnant, but in March her progesterone levels dropped below a level consistent with pregnancy. An investigatory sonogram did not reveal a fetus, but it was not clear whether she had lost the fetus (though she had not passed one) or simply had experienced a false pregnancy.
The failure of Takara’s pregnancy raised a question about the sperm of Kshamenk, the male from Argentina’s Mundo Marino, which had been used in Artificial Insemination (AI) procedures on both Takara and Kasatka. Kshamenk’s sperm is one way for SeaWorld’s captive breeding program to get beyond a preponderance of Tilikum genes, so it is important to the future of orca breeding at SeaWorld. But Kasatka’s pregnancy is progressing, with a fetus visible on sonograms, so Kshamenk’s sperm is at least viable.
So Takara will not be giving birth along with Kasatka and Kohana. However, she seems healthy despite the false or failed pregnancy, and SeaWorld plans to try and inseminate her again by mid-summer. Not sure whether they will use Kshamenk’s sperm again. But SeaWorld also has an AI and sperm collection arrangement with Marineland Antibes in France, which used sperm from SeaWorld California’s Ulises to impregnate their younger female, Wikie. That led to the birth of a calf called Moana last year. Marineland Antibes has two males, Valentin and Inouk, who are sexually mature and presumably could also be used as sperm donors for SeaWorld’s breeding program.
SeaWorld Florida also has plans to AI Kayla sometime soon (in March I mentioned she was next on the AI list), though apparently she does not cycle normally, so the timing is a bit tricky.
That’s all the orca pregnancy news I have for the moment. So let the skeptics have at it…
(Don’t) Supersize Me
We’re America, so bigger is better. Except when it’s not, like when it drives up our carbon footprint and consumption without really making us any happier.
YES magazine has some telling charts on the growth of home sizes in the United States.
The biggest appeal to me of downsizing is that it requires getting rid of all the stuff your family accumulates because you have space to accumulate.
Anyhow, here is the extreme counterpoint to the McMansion revolution in America: a tiny house:
In 2004, Williams sold her bungalow, shedding a mortgage payment of over $1,000 per month, and bought plans for an 84-square-foot house on wheels. It cost her $10,000 to build, a quarter of which went for photovoltaic panels that generate her electricity. Now her house is paid for, and her monthly bills total about $8—for heating.
Even with the economic freedom she gained, it wasn’t easy to leave her house. “I loved my house and I liked my community in Portland.” And she knew that day-to-day life in the tiny house would be very different. “I’m going to have to carry water, I’m going to have to deal with my compost toilet, find a place to shower.”
“It was scary,” she admits. “But I also felt like, God! This is so cool!”
Leaving her stuff behind was not that hard for Williams. It was liberating. She got rid of photos, old love letters, her college letter jacket—“all that crap that you have because it reminds you of who you used to be.” Her friends and family have quit giving her things for Christmas, she says, “unless I get some kind of, you know, short fork!” She allows herself to own no more than 300 items, and she keeps careful count. “Not because I have obsessive-compulsive disorder,” she laughs, but because she once bet a friend that she had less stuff than he did. She’s kept count ever since.
I know my wife and kids could not go that low, but it’s an example of how simplicity can work. And how current assumptions about what we think we need are both out of tune with reality, and way, way, off.
The Meaning Of A Dead Orca
It’s hard to see the nobility, or the preservation of worthwhile values, in this.
This orca was killed with a harpoon, fired from a speedboat off St. Vincent and The Grenadines. The photo was posted by the West Indian Wildlife Conservation Society (WIWCS), and further disseminated by the American Cetacean Society. According to the WIWCS: “It happens almost on a weekly basis on the west coast of Saint Vincent, however, usually the victims are Pilot Whales. This is the second or third time an Orca has been killed off of St. Vincent.”
It’s of course terrible to see such an intelligent and socially sophisticated animal slaughtered (and the Facebook comments are running wild with opprobrium). But the hard reality is that traditional whale hunts, or the claim of “tradition” to protect whale hunting, will not go away until the economic needs of the hunters are addressed (subsidized Japanese whalers excepted; that’s a whole other twisted national identity issue).
Just one more example of the hard fact that we need to see the world–and its peoples and economies–as deeply interconnected, and act on the enormous disparities in wealth, before we can truly address the cruel practices that poverty breeds.
And, just as an aside, the slaughterhouse and industrial farming practices that produce the meat eaten by many who are outraged by whale hunting, are equally cruel and barbaric. So there is an issue of moral consistency that needs to be addressed, as well.
The Earthist Chronicles 