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11th March 2023
12:56pm GMT
Kiska, known to many as the 'world's loneliest orca whale', has died after spending decades in captivity.
The mammal's death was announced Friday by MarineLand in Niagra Falls, Ontario, where she had been living.
MarineLand said Kiska's health had declined in recent weeks.
"Marine mammal care team and experts did everything possible to support Kiska's comfort and will mourn her loss," local media quoted the theme park as saying.
The national animal law organisation, Animal Justice, has called for MarineLand to be investigated and prosecuted following the death of the 47-year-old whale.
Kiska was held in solitary confinement and faced a lifetime of loneliness after being snatched from her family as a baby near Iceland in 1979. She was later sold into the aquarium industry.
She lost every one of her MarineLand calves - five of them - before they were seven years old. Then she lost her tankmate.
The Whale Sanctuary Project said Kiska has lived in isolation in a concrete tank since 2011 and, "when not swimming in slow circles, she often floats in place, staring at the emptiness that is the inside of her tank."
Although she no longer performed before her death, Kiska remained on display and was the last captive orca in the whole of Canada.
In 2021, footage of her banging her head into the tank walls went viral leading to anti-captivity and animal rights activists starting the hashtag '#FreeKiska'.
More recently, Kiska’s suffering made headlines around the world as videos emerged showing her floating listlessly in her tank.
Animal Justice fought for Kiska for over a decade and filed legal complaints demanding an investigation into MarineLand for the way it held Kiska. It also helped pass a provincial ban on keeping orcas in Ontario in 2015, and a national ban on keeping whales and dolphins in captivity in 2019.
Executive director of Animal Justice, Camille Labchuk, wrote: "It is heartbreaking to know that Kiska will never have the chance to be relocated to a whale sanctuary, and experience the freedom that she so deeply deserved.
"While no other orca will have to suffer the cruelty of captivity in Canada again, we are demanding justice for what Kiska endured at the hands of Marineland.
"We are calling on provincial authorities to make public the results of a post-mortem, and prosecute Marineland for the unlawful distress Kiska clearly experienced throughout her final years.”
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