Friday, May 16, 2025

Humpback Whale Spotted in Potomac River

Old Wrong Way Willy, at the Chesapeake Bay Mag, VIDEO: Humpback Whale Spotted Breaching Inside the Potomac River

Tom D’Alleva, a one-time commercial captain and sailing instructor, and his daughter, the content creator known online as Captain Boomies, were delivering a boat from Baltimore’s Inner Harbor to the D.C. Boat Show in late April when they saw something surprising.

They were traveling just inside the mouth of the Potomac at about 30 knots aboard a 43-foot Pardo yacht. D’Avella says they saw a group of birds at the surface of the water. “Then we saw this whale come charging out right where the birds were, and then falling over,” he says. “We were so shocked by it!”


D’Avella was at the helm of the boat, but his daughter quickly pulled out her phone to record. See the video below (we’re showing it to you in real time, then in slow motion to make the apparent whale more visible):

We sent the video to experts at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS) and the Potomac Riverkeeper Network, who passed it on to Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command (NAVFAC) and a Georgetown University biologist who studies marine mammals.

Dr. Janet Mann, a biology and pyschology professor at Georgetown, launched the Potomac-Chesapeake Dolphin Project in 2015. She believes the animal seen breaching the surface in the video is a small humpback whale. “The pectoral fin and shape give it away,” she tells us. “Very, very cool!”
This “dropped pin” shows where Captain Boomies and D’Avella spotted the whale.

At VIMS, several staff members agree that it appears to be a juvenile humpback. A contact at NAVFAC, which manages the U.S. Navy’s Marine Species Monitoring program and specifically tracks humpbacks, came to the same conclusion. The NAVFAC staff member notes that the whale in the video is likely a yearling, migrating back north from the Dominican Republic.

“We knew a whale didn’t belong there, it was really unusual,” D’Avella tells us. “I had seen them off the coast of Florida and in the British Virgin Islands [in the past].”

NAVFAC says they do see humpbacks as far north as the Potomac on the Chesapeake Bay from time to time.

During the thousands of hours Mann’s team has spent in the lower Potomac studying dolphins, she says they have never seen a humpback whale inside the river. It’s not uncommon for humpbacks to be spotted at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay or just off the coast of Virginia during their migration. She wonders if the menhaden might be attracting them to come closer.

Video at link, it's terrible video, but the miracle is they had camera running at just the right time. 

The Wombat has Rule 5 Sunday: Head On ready and willing to accept your clicks.

No comments:

Post a Comment