How an orca held captive at the Vancouver Aquarium helped changed the world's view on killer whales

It's been 43 years since the death of Skana, the Vancouver Aquarium's first resident orca, who experts believe changed the way people viewed killer whales and spurred a global movement in whale conservation.

Today, the resident killer whales that frequent the waters off British Columbia's South Coast are endangered, protected and beloved. But whaling once thrived in the area, particularly during the '60s and the '70s.

"Killer whales were typically seen through the eyes of fear," said Chloe Robinson, director of the whales initiative at Ocean Wise, a non-profit conservation group that conducts research on killer whales and other marine mammals.

"It was actually Skana who helped people overcome that fear and fall in love with them."

In his book, Orca: How We Came to Know and Love the Ocean's Greatest Predator, author and University of Victoria historian Jason Colby says killer whales were considered "not just as vermin species but potentially dangerous" creatures to be hunted and eliminated.   

"It started with slaughter by fishermen, then followed by captivity for entertainment," he said in a previously recorded interview with CBC.

The waters in southern British Columbia and Washington state were the world's principal source of captive killer whales for marine theme parks between 1964 and 1976, according to Colby.

In 1967, a pod of orcas was brought for display at the Vancouver Boat, Trailer and Sports Travel Show. Among the pod was a 1,360-kilogram, 4.3-metre-long female, later named Skana — the Haida term for killer whale.

First captured in Puget Sound, Skana was later sold to the Vancouver Aquarium, where she lived out her life.

She remained at the aquarium for 12 years, where she garnered thousands of admirers, young and old, who came to watch her perform and swim in her aquarium home. Skana died on Oct. 5, 1980 from an infection. 

According to Colby's book, Skana made her most consequential impact on Paul Spong, a New Zealand-born scientist hired by the aquarium to study her.

His research would eventually lead him to work with Greenpeace and launch a worldwide campaign against commercial whaling.

The relationship between the New-Zealander scientist and the killer whale is detailed in Erich Hoyt's book Orca: The Whale Called Killer. 

After studying Skana for over a year, Spong concluded that killer whales are, according to an excerpt from the book, "an incredibly powerful and capable creature, exquisitely self-controlled and aware of the world around it, a being possessed of a zest for life and a healthy sense of humour and, moreover, a remarkable fondness for and interest in humans."