‘Free Kshamenk’: The campaign to release the last captive orca in Latin America

A social media campaign by activists has brought the 4-ton orca a following far beyond what might usually be expected at his oceanarium 200 miles from Buenos Aires.

The last captive orca in all of Latin America cuts a lonely figure. “Kshamenk” has lived in the Mundo Marino oceanarium in the Argentine city of San Clemente del Tuyú since 1992 – the majority of that time, following the death of his female companion in 2000, as the lone representative of his species. But in recent weeks, Kshamenk has amassed something of a following. One far beyond what might usually be expected at his oceanarium some 320 kilometers (200 miles) from Buenos Aires. A campaign by the Canadian activist group UrgentSeas – which has been working to secure Kshamenk’s release – is building steam thanks to a series of clips on social media that allegedly show the orca in his tank, barely moving. One of the group’s latest posts shows a timelapse video of what it says is a bird’s eye view of Mundo Marino in August and has the hashtag “FreeKshamenk.” It has already amassed more than 184,000 responses on TikTok. Mundo Marino claims the images posted by UrgentSeas “have been maliciously manipulated as part of a disinformation campaign to suggest that Kshamenk is inactive and to make a negative diagnosis about his health, without any objective veterinary indicators.”