This past weekend, on July 24, bystanders captured rare footage of a humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) launching out of the water and landing on a nearby boat off the coast of Plymouth, Massachusetts. This incident joins a handful of others in the past decade—including close calls in the same area just days before—in which whales have collided with seacraft, raising the question of just how aware the oceanic giants are of what’s going on at the surface.
John Calambokidis, a marine mammal biologist and research scientist with the Washington-based nonprofit Cascadia Research Collective, spoke with The Scientist after reviewing the footage. He notes that baleen whales such as humpbacks don’t have the same sensory capabilities as their echolocating, toothed relatives. And as a result, “every now and then we see this in our work; the whale will either be distracted when it’s feeding, or it might be engaged in social ...
