I was 16 when I began work in June 1902 at the whaling station. I had heard of the killers that every year helped whalers catch huge whales. I thought, at the time, that this was just a story but then I witnessed it with my own eyes many times.
On the afternoon I arrived at the station, as I was I sorting out my' accommodation, I heard a loud noise coming from the bay. We ran down to the shore in time to see an enormous animal opposite us throwing itself out of the water and then crashing down again. It was black and white and fish-shaped. But I knew it wasn't a fish.
"That's Old Tom, the killer," one of the whalers, George, called out to me. "He's telling us there's a whale out there for us."
Another whaler yelled out, "Rush-oo ...rush-oo." This was the call that announced there was about to be a whale hunt.
"Come on, Clancy. To the boat," George said as he ran ahead of me. I had already heard that George didn't like being kept waiting, so even though I didn't have the right clothes on, I raced after him.
Without pausing we jumped into the boat with the other whalers and headed out into the bay. I looked down into the water and could see Old Tom swimming by the boat, showing us the way. A few minutes later, there was no Tom, so George started beating the water with his oar and there was Tom, circling back to the boat, leading us to the hunt again.
Using a telescope we could see that something was happening. As we drew closer, I could see a whale being attacked by a pack of about six other killers.
"What're they doing?" I asked George.
"Well, it's teamwork - the killers over there are throwing themselves on top of the whale's blow-hole to stop it breathing. And those others are stopping it diving or fleeing out to sea," George told me, pointing towards the hunt. And just at that moment, the most extraordinary thing happened. The killers started racing between our boat and the whale just like a pack of excited dogs.
Then the harpoon was ready and the man in the bow of the boat aimed it at the whale. He let it go and the harpoon hit the spot. Being badly wounded, the whale soon died. Within a moment or two, its body was dragged swiftly by the killers down into the depths of the sea. The men started turning the boat around to go home.
"What's happened?" I asked. "Have we lost the whale?"
"Oh no," Jack replied. "We'll return tomorrow to bring in the body. It won't float up to the surface for around 24 hours." "In the meantime, Old Tom, and the others are having a good feed on its lips and tongue," added Red, laughing.
Although Old Tom and the other killers were fierce hunters, they, never harmed or attacked people. In fact, they protected them. There was one day when we were out in the bay during a hunt and James was washed off the boat.
"Man overboard! Turn the boat around!" urged George, shouting loudly.
The sea was rough that day and it was difficult to handle the boat. The waves were carrying James further and further away from us. From James's face, I could see he was terrified of being abandoned by us. Then suddenly I saw a shark.
"Look, there's a shark out there," I screamed.
"Don't worry, Old Tom won't let it near," Red replied.
It took over half an hour to get the boat back to James, and when we approached him, I saw James being firmly held up in the water by Old Tom. I couldn't believe my eyes.
There were shouts of "Well done, Old Tom" and 'Thank God" as we pulled James back into the boat. And then Old Tom was off and back to the hunt where the other killers were still attacking the whale. |