Killer Whales: Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Nearly Decimated This Pod (Part 2) | National Geographic

Toa Nutella sweet, huh? Boom, channel 16. In the morning, we make contact with Craig Matka. He's agreed to give us rare access to his research. Most studies on the effects of the spill started after the fact, but Craig's work predates the spill. So if anyone can tell us the true story of the Prince William Sound, it's Craig and his team.

"Hey, Carnage, very nice to meet you. I get started with killer whales because they seem to keep following me around. It just seems like I need to know something about them. Well, the Exxon Valdez oil spill had a major effect on one particular pod. We end up losing nine total. We were then able to track what happened with these groups. The killer whale, or orca, is the world's largest dolphin species and one of the smartest predators. We've been working pretty seriously to document the population, and Exxon basically denied there was much of an effect on anything at the beginning. However, just the data was so strong, and the fact that we could determine who was born and died in these groups, they had a very hard time arguing with the evidence we have."

Through his research, Craig and his team determined that a pod of whales caught up in the spill, known as the Chugach transients, have their own unique language and gene pool. Since the spill, they have not reproduced. It's been 1986 since the last time that they had a calf, but certainly after the oil spill, there was a—you know, they were hammered. There’s this big social disruption, and then some of the survivors are ill also. So here, disturbing a culture.

Craig and his team say that the Chugach pod was likely contaminated by the spill to successfully reproduce. The oil affected the whales' habitat in a number of ways, with the beaches being, of course, the most impacted areas. There's still oil in the sediments on a number of the beaches.

To get a sense for how far the oil extended 26 years ago, we're meeting up with Terry Kennedy. Terry flew over the spill that day and has been watching the Prince William Sound from the sky ever since.

"Ready? Yeah, let me just start this guy. How many years have you been flying?"

"Oh, I started when I was a teenager, 14. I was 54 years ago, and then I've been flying commercially for 46 years. Awesome country. Yeah, no, I mean it's been a fantastic place to fly."

"The toe-in and toe-out 206, Fox 206 box. Not do a sec side, just so you go by there. Hey Greg, you're looking good from way up here. How's your day going so far?"

"Beautiful day. Haven't found any whales yet, but so yeah, we'll probably head down this way, and if we don't find any, we'll head up Prince of Wales."

"Copy that. Yo, Easter is beautiful from up here."

"Oh bad. Oh bad. Alright, well, sounds good, but we'll probably rendezvous with you later on today."

"Copy that. Yeah, we've got our Sat phone on. I mean, there's no denying it's stunning. You know how much of this landscape here that we're seeing had oil from the time?"

"Well, most of it came down and out through this portion of South. I was the second airplane over that morning, you know, and basically all it looked like was a big nut flush in the water to me, you know, what I could see. And then later on was when it started hitting the beaches, and you really saw, you know, the effects of it."

"So anything you saw was on the shoreline?"

"No, you didn't see a big blob or anything like that, but when it would hit the beaches, and you could really see the stuff, there’s some peat. Did you go to? You can still smell it. You know, it's there to this day, so smell it!"

"Alright, so we just got off a float plane, McTarry, and what I found really fascinating is as we were flying over, we saw dozens and dozens of fishing boats that are going after pink salmon right along the shoreline. It makes you wonder how much spilled oil could still be here after all these years. Here, there are hundreds of salmon swimming over the spot where we're told that there's toxic oil from 26 years ago."

"Yell morning! Tuesday today. Don't go in 30 knots, please. 70 building to 12 feet in the afternoon."