This Tuesday, July 28, a newborn humpback whale calf was born, an event that could easily have gone unnoticed, since it happened in the open sea. But the moment was captured by a drone pilot who was in the right place at the right time.
Alex Forrest was piloting his drone over the waters off the north coast of the Australian state of New South Wales, gathering aerial observations of the migration of humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) for ORRCA, a cetacean, seal, and dugong rescue group in that region of Australia.
The pilot noticed something strange in the behavior of an adult female, which was migrating north. In a social media post, he writes that “one whale stood out: an adult alone, traveling very slowly in shallow waters.”
Forrest admits that, for a moment, he thought the animal was sleeping, until it surfaced, the surface stained with blood. Seconds later, from the red tide emerged a small humpback whale calf: the newborn was breathing air for the first time in its new world.
More members of ORRCA joined the pilot, continuing to monitor the mother and calf until sunset.
This is considered only the fourth time that a full humpback whale birth has been captured on video and the first to be recorded by a drone.
“Although humpback whales give birth every year, witnessing and documenting the entire birth sequence is exceptionally rare,” writes ORRCA.
“Each observation like this has the potential to increase our knowledge about humpback whale reproduction, maternal behavior and the early stages of a calf’s life,” explains the organization.
According to the information released, the footage will now undergo rigorous analysis and will serve as the basis for a scientific publication.
