Killing Keiko (20 page)

Between the raging battles playing out on the computer screen and the never-ending
meetings on the finer points of the barrier net, Keiko himself began to exhibit troubling
signs. After months of progress and reaching new levels in physical stamina, he suddenly
slowed. His interest in everything had dwindled, including food and the normally intriguing
activity going on around the bay pen. His diet went from 120 pounds of fish a day
to less than twenty. We saw a return of traditional lazy behavior such as floating
at the surface and slow responses during interactions with the Behavior Team.

Going off his food was not a good sign. It could be related to almost anything, but
often the first concern is physical well-being. Was he sick? Was Keiko’s system fighting
something? On the heels of recent foul weather and endless changes implemented in
his conditioning program, it would not be uncommon for stress to compromise Keiko’s
immune system. That, added to the surge currents stirring the pot, quite possibly
introducing a plethora of bacteria or pathogens to Klettsvik Bay, meant anything and
everything had to be considered. In August we had seen a flare-up of Keiko’s skin
condition, a papillomavirus that acted much like the human herpes virus. Although
the condition did not advance to the ugly cauliflower-like growths they had witnessed
in Mexico and Newport, the early-stage pinholes appearing on certain areas
of his body were surely indicative of a weakening immune system or heightened stress
levels.

Normal procedure dictates the collection of various diagnostic samples on a routine
basis, such as blood samples, blowhole cultures (like a throat culture), cytology,
fecal and urine samples and a host of other clinical metrics. Like many zoological
animals, Keiko was well trained to provide these samples voluntarily. In the professional
field of animal care, these sometimes-daily routines are called “animal husbandry.”
Husbandry diagnostics are the front line in preventative care. Since animals cannot
tell us, “Hey, my tummy hurts,” there are few other means by which to proactively
discover and treat a potentially serious health threat. Even the most innocuous event
can become life threatening if undiscovered and untreated long enough.

Yet no routine medical evaluation existed for Keiko. Largely because he was considered
a temporary resident, Dr. Cornell played a dangerous game of “don’t ask, don’t tell”
with Keiko’s health. He did not pursue any regular husbandry schedule. In the time
I spent with Keiko, blood samples and other health measures were only taken when there
was a preexisting concern … a red flag.

By the time Keiko had lost interest in his food, it was time to be very concerned.
Why? Waiting until an animal loses interest in eating to investigate is like waiting
until steam is coming from under a car’s hood only to find out that the engine is
overheated. Many times it’s too late to reverse the damage. As gauges are to an automobile,
so too is husbandry to zoological care. Constituting an end-run around Lanny, Robin
immediately took blood samples from Keiko and had the basic levels analyzed at a hospital
in Reykjavik. This action alone flew in the face of protocol. Yet Robin knew any samples
sent to Lanny would be ignored or worse, reported as “within normal limits.” It didn’t
take long before Robin had the results. We were lucky … this time.

Keiko’s white blood cell count was normal, and his blood showed only a very slight
decline in hydration level. The normal white blood cell count told us that he was
not fighting an infection, and the mild
deviation in hydration markers seemed to be only in response to his recent drop in
eating. Normal for a killer whale, Keiko’s only material source of water was the moisture
in his fish. If he didn’t eat enough, he would soon become dehydrated, starting an
avalanche of other medical problems. Maintaining good hydration is paramount in proactive
health maintenance for any animal or person.

Our initial fears were allayed, but the problem was far from solved. What had caused
the appreciable change in Keiko’s behavior and his loss of appetite? In zoological
care, there are standards for evaluating this type of mystery; a process of elimination,
analyzing the usual suspects and going down the list.

Among the battery of customary tests, we ran water quality sampling, cultures around
every conceivable husbandry area and finally analysis of Keiko’s food.

It did not take long to find the culprit. After receiving the nutritional analysis
results, we realized that a the original herring lot had been swapped with an untested
lot. The freezer-house manager didn’t even consider that the change in fish mattered.
After all, what could the difference between one box of fish and another matter to
a whale. In fact it made all the difference! The new lot replaced the former 440 kilocalorie-per-pound
fish with herring much richer in fat and nearly double in caloric content. Unbeknownst
to us, the key ingredient in Keiko’s diet had changed substantially.

Each lot of fish is different. Two differing lots may be caught at opposing times
of the year and in different locations. They may even be processed and frozen using
varied methods. All of these discrepancies have an impact on the nutritional content
of the fish, from protein and ash to water content, and of course, fat and calories.
Somewhere in the recent past, likely weeks prior, the lot had changed. We had been
feeding Keiko the equivalent of a six-course holiday dinner day-in and day-out. It
was no wonder he had lost interest in food. Worse, as he became satiated with the
high fat levels, he had also become inactive, the majority of his energy
drained in the process of burning off the excess nourishment. We weren’t unfamiliar
with the symptoms.

Frustration was an understatement. The oversight in Keiko’s diet was a stupid mistake
and one that would cost us dearly in the advancement of his rehabilitation. Further
complicating the situation, we had no other source of herring with which to replace
the calorific lot. Our only option was to decrease Keiko’s daily intake to less than
twenty percent of what it had been. At this level, even if he showed interest in exercise
and activity, we had to be careful not to overwork him. The severely reduced diet
meant he would not be receiving the water a whale of his size required. We immediately
began sourcing a new lot of herring, one low in fat and calories and high in moisture.
Ironically, the source we found would have to be shipped from Boston, and the process
of importing a fish back to Iceland was not a simple one.

Pressing forward, many of Keiko’s sessions involved no food at all. Initially, any
interest he displayed in his trainers quickly dissipated if we so much as showed him
a food bucket. On one side of the equation, we worked to carefully increase his calorie
burn, to break him out of the lethargy, and to help his body to rid itself of the
amassing blubber. On the flip side, lacking any better source of food for the time
being, we continued feeding Keiko the fat pills. This 10,000-pound animal, typically
consuming over 150 pounds of fish a day, was now only able to stomach twenty pounds
in the same time. We were in a deep hole, and it would be a long slow climb out.

At least some forms of progress offered a small but welcome respite from the setbacks
with Keiko. August saw the advancement of barrier net plans, as they emerged from
paper to reality. Robin, Charles and Jean-Michel Cousteau (a famous son of Jacques
Cousteau and the head of Ocean Futures Society) had met with net makers in Reykjavik,
one of the few possible vendors that would consider the task. Like any undertaking
that pushed the envelope on
accomplishing the impossible, there were many contractors who would not touch the
barrier net for fear of backlash and the risk of liability. Still, the organization
was serious enough that the dredge of persistent obstacles had not yet deterred the
way forward.

No matter the commitment, progress was agonizingly slow. So many surveys of the bay,
core samples, test materials and cross-examination of willing contractors dragged
on, stifled at times by a season rife with holidays, traditional celebrations and
festivals. One in particular virtually shut down the island of Heimaey for more than
ten days. That was none other than the world famous People’s Feast.

The celebration began in 1874 on the mainland commemorating the 1,000th anniversary
of Iceland’s semi-independence from Denmark. Unable to attend because of inclement
weather, the people of Vestmannaeyjar held their own small celebration. Eventually,
the gala on Heimaey grew vastly more popular than the mainland festival with more
than 10,000 in attendance in recent years. I had heard bizarre stories of this festival
from staff and Icelanders involved in the Keiko project. I took most of the stories
with a grain of salt, as many of the tales surrounding the People’s Feast sounded
far too extraordinary to be literal. The thousands who attend the feast in Heimaey
camp on the island’s only golf course (the second northernmost golf course in the
world) and create a tent city, a mini suburb, erected overnight for the three primary
days of merriment.

Camping, barbecues, bonfires, fireworks, singing, dancing and even festival arts are
there for the taking. Not on the published schedule, but informally known as a highlight
festivity: sex in the open fields surrounding the tent suburbia. This I had to see
to believe. Really. Surely this was but another grand exaggeration.

Not so. In fact, should an Icelander ever scream “duck,” do not hesitate to do so,
quickly. In my experience, their culture doesn’t know how to exaggerate. Most folklore
I had heard initially came across as farcical. After all, I wasn’t just some gullible
American. Wrong. Icelanders don’t do April Fools. They don’t have any
interest in impressing their audience via hyperbole. A 100-mph wind is a moderate
breeze. In their matter of fact way, they simply state what is. After witnessing multiple
entangled silhouettes rhythmically dancing on the hillside at the People’s Feast,
I never again underestimated the colorful stories I was told about Iceland. In most
cases, it was safest to overestimate.

The Storm

New digs, conceptions of a barrier net, staffing changes and advancing outlines of
a formal release plan filled a busy August, brought to a close by the unforgettable
People’s Feast. The end of summer also meant the arrival of winter’s foul weather.
On the southern border of the mainland, we were the bull’s-eye for all northward bound
storms following the Gulf Stream. Wind and rain, the most obvious of the elements
that stirred up Klettsvik’s innards were not our greatest foes. Within the seclusion
of the bay, currents posed the biggest challenge. Any notion of avoiding them was
delusional.

The surge currents of Klettsvik were elusive and mysterious. They could occur in concert
with a clear and present storm threat, or they could rush into the bay on a bright
and sunny day completely unannounced. The frightening strength bestowed an ominous
reputation of the surge among the staff. No one took it lightly. No one wanted to
be stuck on the bay pen when the nightmarish current struck.

Somewhat in jest, but all too necessary, we often spent time lying on the floor with
an upside-down perspective looking at the
layout of the research shack’s interior. The exercise was intended to give us a familiarity
with our surroundings should we ever have need of escaping an overturned and underwater
habitat. The possibility of the research shack taking an inverted plunge was not far
from reality. Should the bay pen’s superstructure give way, the resulting imbalance
of the top-heavy segment holding the research shack would cause it to immediately
flip. Tangled in anchor lines and tossed by a current strong enough to pull the bay
pen to pieces, no one on the team had escaped the thought of being trapped inside
a watery coffin. In the less than forty degree Fahrenheit water, even a survival suit
can only sustain a person for so long. Certainly not long enough to get a rescue boat
to the bay pen in severe weather.

The Icelandic Coast Guard (ICG) contingent in Heimaey possessed one of the most remarkable
spectacles of oceanic rescue any of us had ever laid eyes on. A thing of sheer utilitarian
beauty, the jet-driven rescue vessel, aptly named
Thor
, was everything anyone on the receiving end of its hospitality could ever hope for,
and it certainly lived up to its legendary Nordic namesake. Bright orange, so as to
be easily seen under any conditions, the
Thor
was the quintessential masculine mechanical beast: an M-1 Abrams of the sea.

Roughly thirty feet in length, the
Thor
was proportionally thin for its span. Its hull design gave it an appearance of a
thoroughbred dancing at the start gate and ready to go all out. The perimeter of the
boat was made of buoyant foam-filled pontoons called sponsons. The pilothouse (which
consumed a majority of the deck space) sat just aft of amidships, centered on the
beam. Upside down, the
Thor
was a submarine of sorts. The pilothouse was designed to be completely watertight.
However, if ever capsized the
Thor
would not stay that way long; the vessel had a self-righting ability, meaning it
could flip itself upright.

We took the
Thor
out to sea a few times, though never under our own control; the ICG always manned
this vessel—no one else. Those few outings were almost exclusively for whale watching
or tracking the seasonal movements of the wild killer whales around Heimaey.

Inside the pilothouse, the fixtures and accoutrements clearly illustrated its business-only
temperament. Every seat in the cabin was adorned with safety restraints more overzealous
than the most extreme roller coaster. Designed to give her pilot complete stability
in relentless seas, the captain’s chair was afloat on a heavy piston that would mitigate
backbreaking jolts common in high seas and foul weather. Every steerage the pilot
needed was attached to this shock-absorbing seat, even the singular do-everything
joystick control. So stout and convincing was the
Thor
(and the ICG) that it gave me a dangerous confidence at sea … as if my only interest
in plus-twenty-foot seas was a morbid curiosity of how the
Thor
would power through or dance over the pounding waves.