The Orca Ocean at Loro Parque in the Canary Islands is where Spanish wildlife trainer Alexis Martinez trained orcas. He was killed during a Christmas show practice on December 24, 2009, two months before the death of Dawn Brancheau, perhaps SeaWorld’s most famous orca assault victim. The postmortem results showed that Martinez died as a result of the attack’s fatal injuries, even though the park initially claimed that his death was an accident. Even worse, according to the park, an additional orca attack that occurred two years prior was merely an accident.
Alexis Martinez and Keto
Alexis Martinez, 29, has been working with orcas at Loro Parque for three years. Estefanía Luis Rodriguez, his partner, described the animal lover as “handsome, generous, and funny.” She revealed that Martinez had expressed concerns regarding his work at Orca Ocean. In the last weeks before his death, he said, the killer whales become angry, unruly, and rebellious. At first, the park characterized his death as an unfortunate accident and said his body showed no evidence of violence, until the postmortem report showed bite marks, torn organs, and a crushed chest.
Keto, a 6,600-pound man who was born in a SeaWorld park in 1995, has never seen the ocean. He has performed in parks in Ohio, Texas, San Diego, and the Canary Islands. He was in his third year at Orca Ocean in Loro Parque when the incident happened. Keto was one of four orcas that SeaWorld donated to Loro Parque.
This Was The Fateful Training Session
Martinez’s background played a significant role in preparing the animals for the upcoming Christmas show. One of the achievements was a stand-on spy hop, in which the trainer walked on top of the killer whale as he came out of the water. However, the prank didn’t go as planned since Martinez fell into the water when Keto leaned to one side. Martinez followed instructions and gave him a neutral response with no reward. The orca quickly got fish as a prize after working with another trainer.
When Martinez got back to working with Keto, he performed a trick in which he rode the orca into the pool and then slid up onto the stage. Martinez had to swim back alone because Keto went too far. However, the orca seemed to be blocking his trainer’s path to the platform.
Martínez’s Last Hours
Martinez was instructed to swim cautiously to another pool while Keto was preoccupied with a coworker. However, Keto went straight after Martinez, slamming into him, drowning him, and violently manipulating his body. Eventually, other trainers called Keto into another pool so they could recover Martinez, who had been fatally injured. Unfortunately, he died a few months before the SeaWorld attack that murdered Dawn Brancheau.
The Previous Loro Parque Orca Attack
In 2007, the killer whale Tekoa attacked 29-year-old German orca trainer Claudia Vollhardt, sending her to the hospital. At the Orca Ocean in Loro Parque, Vollhardt was practicing a trick with Tekoa, in which the orca would nudge her feet with its snout as they swam together. Instead, Tekoa hit the victim from underneath, ensnared her arm in its teeth, and pulled her under water several times before letting her go. The spokeswoman for Loro Parque at the time described the occurrence as an accident because “the whale did not bite her.” If it had, she would have lost her arm.
SeaWorld’s Demise?
Since the 2013 release of the documentary Blackfish, marine parks have been the focus of intense public criticism. The death rates of captive orcas are higher than those of their wild counterparts. Normally, they would spend the rest of their life together, but they aren’t with their family. They are also restricted to a tank rather than being able to go great distances in the ocean. In order to provide rescued cetaceans like Keto with this freedom for the first time while still receiving human care, a group known as the Whale Sanctuary Project is working to create large coastal sanctuaries.
