Animal activists have fought for years to free the orca, known as Lolita, from the Miami Seaquarium.
In response to a petition filed in 2013 by a consortium of animal rights groups, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA) Fisheries ruled Wednesday that "captive animals such as Lolita
cannot be assigned separate legal status from their wild counterparts."
Lolita came from a specific population of orcas that has been listed as
endangered since 2005.
The ruling does not affect other
captive orcas in the U.S., says Michael Milstein, a public affairs
officer with NOAA Fisheries. Lolita is a special case because she is the
only known captive orca in the U.S. from the only population of the
species that is considered endangered according to the federal
Endangered Species Act.
Wednesday's ruling does not have
an immediate effect on Lolita, Milstein said, because "the Endangered
Species Act does not prohibit keeping of captive animals." In fact, he
said that releasing an orca that has been captive so long could put her
and wild animals at risk from disease or aggression.
"Our primary concern is with the safety of wild whales," he said, "in addition to the safety of the captive whale itself."
Unique Whale
Lolita
was caught in Puget Sound and has been on display at the Miami
Seaquarium since 1970. NOAA verified through genetic testing and
physical characteristics that the whale originated from the population
known as the Southern Resident Killer Whales,
which spend much of the year in the inland waters of Washington and
British Columbia. That population was classified as endangered in 2005
and is thought to include only about 80 whales.
NOAA
Fisheries ruled on Lolita's status after receiving 17,000 comments from
the public, most of which supported her inclusion in the endangered
species designation, Milstein said.
This isn't the first
time a government agency has included captive animals in endangered
species designations. The government previously listed sturgeon; the
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is currently considering the status of
captive chimpanzees.
Legal Battle to Come?
Animal rights activists hope the new designation moves Lolita a step closer to release.
"Now
that Lolita has been given additional protection from 'harm and
harassment' (how else can being confined to the smallest orca tank in
North America, denied an orca companion or shelter from the sun, and
forced to perform stupid tricks be described?), we'll work to ensure
that these protections are enforced and continue to push for her
retirement and release," the nonprofit group People for the Ethical
Treatment of Animals (PETA) said in a blog post on Wednesday.
A government official familiar with the issue said that PETA may try to use the Endangered Species Act as leverage to sue for the release of Lolita, under the legal precedent that endangered animals cannot be "taken" or "harassed."
PETA did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.
Wednesday's ruling came in response to a petition filed by the PETA Foundation, the Animal Legal Defense Fund, and the Orca Network.
Miami Seaquarium did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
