An orca has rammed into a fisherman's boat in Shetland in what is believed to be the first killer whale attack in UK waters.
Dutchman Dr Wim Rutten, a 72-year old retired physicist, was sailing from Lerwick to Bergen, Norway when the incident occurred.
The experienced yachtsman was fishing for mackerel when the whale began to ram into his boat's stern.
"What I felt [was] most frightening was the very loud breathing of the animal," he explained, adding that he was particularly concerned after hearing of "Portuguese accidents".
Describing his ordeal, the doctor said he first spotted the orca behind his vessel, before it "disappeared but came back at fast speed, twice or thrice and circled a bit."
He told the Guardian that he was unsure whether the mammal wanted "to play, or look me in the eyes, or to get rid of the fishing line."
It follows reports of two similar incidents in Gibraltar earlier this month.
Experts believe the recent spate of attacks that have seen the whales ram and sink boats in the Iberian Peninsula could be down to the creatures seeking to avenge their matriarch after she was struck by fishermen.
In fact, hundreds of coordinated attacks on boats have been reported since 2020.
Earlier this month an orca destroyed the rudder of a yacht leaving its crew adrift off the coast of Gibraltar. Captain of the 48-foot catamaran, Daniel Kriz, said he noticed the "unusual motion of the boat" before spotting a pod of four or five orcas.
And elsewhere in June, Captain Iain Hamilton was marooned in a harbour near Gibraltar after a pod of five whales wrecked both of his boat's rudders in what he described as a "choregraphed" assault that left the vessel "very vulnerable and in a very dangerous situation".
Scientists say the two incidents are likely to be related to a "critical moment of agony" suffered by group leader White Gladis, who either collided with a boat or became entangled with a fishing line.
Marine biologist Alfredo Lopez Fernandez believes the trauma may have caused the whale to become more aggressive, and resulted in others mimicking her behaviour.
He told livescience.com: "That traumatized orca is the one that started this behaviour of physical contact with the boat.
"We do not interpret that the orcas are teaching the young, although the behaviour has spread to the young vertically, simply by imitation, and later horizontally among them, because they consider it something important in their lives."
