Blue Whale Song Recorded Above Water, a Possible First

A camera crew from NBC News may have captured a first this week: the song of a blue whale above the water.

The extraordinarily rare performance occurred off the coast of Long Beach where four blue whales treated a boatful of whale watchers and the news crew to a wild show few people have ever seen.

Alisa Schulman-Janiger, an American Cetacean Society researcher, told Pete Thomas Outdoors it was a once in a lifetime experience.

Hear the blue's low groan here, just after the one-minute mark.

“We heard it through the air, loud and clear,” she said. “It was a strange, alien sound. It really was an extraordinary thing."

Three smaller blue whales, possibily males, were pursuing one larger blue whale, possibly a female, said Schulman-Janiger. They were swimming faster than normal and in tight circles when the female surfaced alongside the Christopher out of Harbor Breeze Cruises.

“If someone would have jumped in the water, they would have landed on top of her,” said Schulman-Janiger. “That’s how close she was to us.” The whales also lunged, chin-slapped and kept after the female.

Then the largest whale let out a roughly 10-second low-pitched groan. The smaller whales were underwater and out of sight while the large one just lay on the surface with a good part of her head above the water. Then the whale made the same kind of sound on the other side of the boat.

Blue whale vocalizations have been picked up on numerous occasions using submerged hydrophones. The largest creatures to have ever inhabited the earth can communicate for up to hundreds of miles, but this was one of the few times, if ever, that a blue whale had been heard vocalizing above water.

“We kept looking around to see where the noise was coming from,” said Schulman-Janiger. “I thought someone was playing a joke or something because I have never heard such a sound nor expected it.”  

Schulman-Janiger said she could clearly see the blowhole and there was no movement during the sound making. Schulman-Janiger has made thousands of whale watching trips, yet she could barely contain her excitement hours after witnessing the performance.

Schulman-Janiger told Pete Thomas Outdoors that she phoned John Calambokidis, one of the world's top blue whale scientists. He told her that in extensive study of blue whales around the world, he had never heard above-surface vocalization.

Very little is actually known about blue whale behavior. The enigmatic leviathan is believed to calf in the Costa Rican Dome, located 500 miles off the Central American country's coast. But not much else is known. Blue whales remain on the endangered species list. In 1931, more than 29,000 blue whales were killed. In 1966, the International Whaling Commission banned all hunting of blue whales.

Kera Mathes from the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach felt privileged to have been part of the trip, shooting photographs and enjoying what might have been a once in a lifetime experience.

“I have never seen anything like it,” said Christopher Capt. Danny Salas. “The whale came to the surface and seemed to be trying to communicate. It was like she was talking to us.”

Footage of the extraordinary encounter was tentatively scheduled to air today on the Today show and Nightly News.