Friends in Japan have shared with me the following report of the capture of 5 killer whales from a pod of ten on 9/10 February 1997.
Concerned people have visited Taiji to investigate what happened. There is no information about the pod affiliations, i.e, one pod or more.
In total 10 orcas were surrounded by a net (80 m x 150 m) and caught in the sea Taiji, Wakayama prefecture.
On 10 February at 6:30 AM the following orcas were delivered to sea worlds:
On 10 February at 11:20 am, 5 other orcas were released. (males: 10M, 5M and 4.5M, and females: 7M, 5M)
Some of the orcas panicked and made sounds constantly.
People have started to send a letter to the government, the above museum and the sea worlds, in protest.
Pieter Folkens animalbytes@earthlink.net