RARE Pod of 40 False Killer Whales Shows up in Newport Beach, CA

On Saturday, March 20th around 12pm the Newport Coastal Adventure boats exited the Newport Beach harbor and came across a pod of over 40 FALSE KILLER WHALES swimming up the coast of Newport Beach, a RARE sighting for this tropical species typically found in warmer waters. The last sighting of false killer whales was in 2019, when they made appearances in Newport Beach on four separate occasions.

False Killer Whales typically visit Newport Beach during ‘Spring Break’ time of the year, and we have never documented these whales this far north in the Summer, Fall or Winter. They travel this way to look of Yellowtail & White Sea Bass to eat. These whales are large, close to 18ft-20ft long, jet black in color and weigh in at 3,000lbs. They are called false killer whales because the skull morphology between killer whales and false killer whales looks very similar, although externally the two toothed whale species look very different from one another.

Although false killer whales are found globally in tropical and subtropical oceans and generally in deep offshore waters, every sighting of them in the Newport Beach area has been in less than 200ft of water.
On Saturday the false killer whales were just 20 feet from Lawler’s small inflatable boat, giving a thrill to passengers who got to see the creatures up close. The chances of encountering false killer whales aboard a whale watching trip are so small, it’s a totally once-a-in a lifetime, extremely rare sighting. Capt. Lawler reported the whales were vocalizing so loud to one another, that you could hear them from above the water. They were still around during his afternoon charter, off Laguna Beach later in the day, and heading southbound last they were sighted on Saturday Afternoon in Laguna Beach.
Since we’ve been seeing Gray Whales every day in Newport Beach, the false killer whale sighting was a nice change of pace!

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