Orcas attack in rare battle of the Titans

A rarely seen battle of the Titans played out off Ocean Beach yesterday when a pair of orcas attacked an eight-metre Brydes whale and its calf.
The orcas began circling the whale and its five-metre calf about 700m from the shore at about 11am, Ocean Beach lifeguard Rob Howes said.
The Brydes whale had been breaching out of the water in an effort to protect her calf but could not shield it from the larger of the two orcas - about six metres long - which latched on to the calf's tail. The other orca had then kept the calf's mother at bay.
Two months ago Mr Howes was among a group saved from a great white shark while swimming at the beach by a pod of dolphins but this time he stayed above water.
Most of the action had taken place underwater but then there would be "just a massive explosion of water" as the calf surfaced followed by an orca hanging on to its tail, Mr Howes said.
"It was quite amazing."
The attack lasted more than three hours.
Mr Howes used a rescue vessel to get within 100m of the whales so he could take photographs for the Department of Conservation.
While assured the orcas would be more interested in the calf than his boat, he admitted he was uneasy getting close to the mammoth creatures.
"It's fine to say that (it's safe) but it's different when you have your a-- on the line," he said.
"We certainly weren't going too close.
"My concern was the whale would try to get away from the killer whale and might come close to the boat.
"When you're out there near a whale that's two times the size of your boat it's a bit scary."
The calf was last seen at about 1.15pm and is believed to be only the second of its species reported as killed by orca in New Zealand waters.
It is the second major marine event at Ocean Beach in recent months. A pod of dolphins made international headlines when they scared off a great white shark lurking near a group of surf lifesavers that included Mr Howes.
He was at a loss to explain the two incidents but thought larger volumes of bait fish might be drawing top-line predators closer to shore.
Department of Conservation community relations officer Reuben Williams said the Orca attack was a "rare event in nature". "To my knowledge there's only been a very few occasions when this has been caught on film," he said.
Floppy Halliday, who is manning the orca hotline in the absence of orca scientist Dr Ingrid Visser, said it was most likely the orca had been trying to drown the calf.
"Orca are the kings of the ocean. They have no natural predators and they eat all sorts of things - that's why they have the name killer whale," she said.
She said it was quite normal for orca to feed on whales but they usually did it in packs.