Enc Date: 01/12/19

Enc Seq: 1

Enc#: 97

Observ Begin: 12:38 PM

Observ End: 01:51 PM

Vessel: Mike 1

Staff: Mark Malleson

Other Observers: Joe Zelwietro

Pods: Transients

Location Descr: Discovery Island

Start Latitude: 48 22.2

Start Longitude: 123 10.7

End Latitude: 48 22.1

End Longitude: 123 02.6

​

Enc Summary:

At 1108 Mark received a text from Dale Mitchell that he had seen a large group of killer whales south of Trial Island heading east while he was scanning from shore. A few minutes later, Mark received a text from Steve McConnell on the pilot boat that he had seen likely the same group to the west at ~1030 passing east past the VH buoy. Steve sent Mark some photos he had taken with his iPhone, and they looked like Bigg's. Mark contacted Joe, and they met at Mike 1 and departed Victoria harbour at ~ 1215. Mark had contacted Gord Rowles earlier to track them from his 23rd-floor apartment, and Gord had last seen them at ~1200 continue southeast after working on a kill slightly south of Discovery Island. When Mike 1 arrived at the spot where Gord had last seen them, they stopped and scanned and could see Jeff Friedman on J1 slightly north of them. They gave Jeff a call to see if he was with anything, and he had just spotted a group of northbound Bigg's, which he later identified as the T034's, T037B's, and the T099's. Mike 1 started to work their way towards Jeff's group when Joe spotted more killer whales ~ 1.5 miles to the south, so they turned around and headed to them instead. At 1231 they came across a large slick from a kill at 48 23.4/123 11.7, which was likely where Gord had last seen them through the Big Eyes. At 1238 Mark and Joe started their encounter after confirming the T035A's, T036A's, and T038A's along with an unidentified bull spread out and traveling east (48 22.2/123 10.7) 3.5 nm SSE of Discovery Island. Joe eventually was able to identify the bull as CA137, and later on in the encounter, Mark had spotted a trailing very cryptic female who was CA040. She would come up for two breaths every 5 - 6 minutes following well behind the rest of the group.
Mike 1 ended the encounter at 1351 at the north edge of Hein Bank as the group continued to travel to the east.