87480334 death at seaworld press kit

8/2/2019 87480334 Death at SeaWorld Press Kit

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DEATH AT SEAWORLD

by DAVID KIRBY

From theNew York Times bestselling author ofEvidence of Harm and

Animal Factory comes DEATH AT SEAWORLD (St. Martins Press;

July 17, 2012; Hardcover) a groundbreaking scientific thriller that

exposes the dark side ofSeaWorld, Americas most beloved marinemammal park. From the tragic death of trainer Dawn Brancheau in

2010, to other, less-publicized violent incidents, journalist David Kirby

puts these brutal human-on-animal attacks in context and explores the

controversial and even lethal ramifications of keeping killer whales in

captivity in DEATH AT SEAWORLD.

DEATH AT SEAWORLD introduces the real people taking part in this

debate, from former trainers turned animal rights activists to the men and

women that champion SeaWorld and the captivity of whales. Kirby

follows the story of marine biologist and animal advocate Naomi Rose at

the Humane Society of the US, whose warnings against keeping killer

whales in captivity fell on deaf ears. He also covers the media backlash,

the eyewitnesses who come forward to challenge SeaWorlds glossyimage, and the groundbreaking OSHA case that may spell the end of

having trainers in the water with the oceans top predators.

Kirby also introduces the reader to various killer whales, or orcas, (who are actually the worlds largest dolphins)and how they rarely, if ever, harm humans in the wild and are among the smartest animals in the world.

He discloses the following shocking points:

There are no records at any time in history of wild orcas seriously attacking or killing a person, but in

captivity, aggressive acts against trainers are not uncommon, sometimes ending in severe injury or death.

Some 15% ofall orcas ever held in SeaWorlds collection have been involved in acts of seriousaggression against trainers, a dismal safety record that would never be tolerated in other industries.

Orcas at SeaWorld have lunged at trainers, pulled them in the water, held them at the bottom of the

pool, head-butted them, slammed them with tail flukes and breached on top of them.

The 12,000 pound Tilikumthe worlds largest captive predator- killed Canadian trainer Keltie Byrnein 1991, attacked Daniel Dukes, a man who snuck into the tank in 1999 but did not make it out, and

brutally killed trainer Dawn Brancheau in 2010.

To date, SeaWorld has spent $65 million since Dawn Brancheaus death on high -tech safety featuressuch as quick-rising false bottoms for pools and emergency spare air oxygen systems for orca trainers atthe Shamu Stadiums in Orlando, San Diego and San Antonio.

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PRAISE FOR DEATH AT SEAWORLD

Entertaining, engaging and enraging - The fairy tale fantasy that the marine mammal industry has spunfor the unwary public is expertly unraveled in this non-fiction crime thriller. Animal advocate Naomi

Rose, who has lived in the wild with killer whales, is the real-life heroine in the battle against thetragedy known as the captive dolphin industry.Louie Psihoyos, Academy Award winning director

ofThe Cove

Death at SeaWorld will become one of the most pivotal books in the orca captivity debate for years tocome, and may well be the catalyst we have all been waiting for towards seeing an end to this cruelty. At

last, both sides of the story behind the events at SeaWorld are being told and the truth is finally getting

out there. Every budding orca trainer should consider this the must-read book of their career.Dr. Ingrid N. Visser, Founder & Principal Scientist, Orca Research Trust

It is sad that this book had to be inspired by the death of trainer Dawn Brancheau in 2010, but DavidKirby has revealed the true heart of this fascinating story of the killer whale, the largest of the dolphins.Accurately, passionately, lovingly and unapologetically, he tells the orcas story, but we also meet thehumans who have captured them, studied them, trained them, exhibited them, and tried to understand

what the author calls (after humans), the most socially and ecologically complex animals on earth.This remarkable book deserves to be acknowledged as the most significant and moving account of theoften disastrous interaction of cetaceans and humans sinceMoby-Dick.Richard Ellis, author of

Men and Whales, The Empty Ocean, and The Great Sperm Whale

Death at SeaWorldis one of the most important books, if not the most important book, ever written onthe horrific plight of captive cetaceans. Focusing on killer whales, the well-known black-and-whiteicons of life in the sea, David Kirby systematically dismantles every single argument used to justify

keeping these incredibly intelligent and sentient beings in the aquatic cages in which they're jammedMarc Bekoff, University of Colorado, author ofThe Emotional Lives of Animals and TheAnimal Manifesto: Six Reasons For Expanding Our Compassion Footprint

In this authoritative and superbly investigative page-turner, certain to ruffle feathers and fins, DavidKirby traces the tale of scientist-conservationist Naomi Rose pitted against SeaWorld bent on turning a

charismatic, intelligent, big-toothed predatorthe killer whale, or orcainto its corporate brand.

Kirby reports brilliantly on the escalating troubles and conflicts, the surprising and sordid underbelly oflifeand deathat SeaWorld.Erich Hoyt, author of the best-selling classic Orca: The WhaleCalled Killer and Research Fellow, Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society

This is a book everyone should read. David Kirby'sDeath at SeaWorldoutlines in grim detail just howbad captivity is for orcas and other marine mammals.Richard O'Barry, Director of Earth IslandInstitute's Dolphin Project and star of the Academy Award-winning documentary, The Cove


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TALKING POINTS for

DEATH AT SEAWORLD

DYING TO ENTERTAIN

Killer whales in captivity have an annual mortality rate that is 2.5 times higherthan killer whales inthe Pacific Northwest.

Among some pods in the Pacific Northwest, males can live up to 60-70 years, with an average life

expectancy of 30, and females can live to 90 or more, with an average life of expectancy of 46.

Most killer whales at SeaWorld die in their teens and twenties, sometimes under abnormalcircumstances.

IN HUMAN CARE

Trainers routinely stuff the gills of fish with antibiotics, antacids and vitamins, and inject them withfresh water, because freezing, storing, thawing and processing fish reduces its nutritional value and fresh

water content and stress is a constant concern.

Some orcas are given up to 80 pounds of gelatin per day in part to combat dehydration.

Some killer whales break and wear down their teeth on metal gates and must have the pulp removed

with a power drill. Teeth then must be flushed several times daily to prevent food from causing deadlybacterial infections. One whale was filmed lashing out aggressively in response to trainers trying to jam a wooden block inhis mouth in order to control him while performing an endoscopy.

ORCA AGGRESSION

There are no records at any time in history of wild orcas seriously injuring or killing a person.

Around 15% of all orcas held in SeaWorlds collection have been involved in acts of seriousaggression against trainers, a dismal safety record that would never be tolerated in other industries.

Orcas at SeaWorld have lunged at trainers, pulled them in the water, held them at the bottom of the

pool, head-butted them, slammed them with tail flukes and breached on top of them.


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The 12,000 pound Tilikumthe worlds largest captive predator- killed Canadian trainer KeltieByrne in 1991, surgically opened the scrotum of Daniel Dukes, a man who snuck into the tank in 1999but did not make it out, and brutally killed trainer Dawn Brancheau in 2010.

Brancheaus death was more grisly than most realize: part of her arm was torn off, her scalp was

ripped away, her sternum was crushed and her liver was lacerated. This was a purposeful killing.

Two months before Brancheau died, trainer Alexis Martinez at Loro Parque in Spain was violentlyrammed and killed by Keto, an orca on loan from SeaWorld.

ORCA CONSERVATION & SCIENCE

Contrary to popular belief, SeaWorld conducts only limited scientific research on killer whales in itscollection, and does very little to directly impact wild orca habitat.

A careful review of the published, peer-reviewed literature shows that most studies done onSeaWorlds orcas pertain to the husbandry of captive animals, with little benefit for those in the ocean.

SeaWorld does not appear to be active in saving the threatened and endangered orcas of the Pacific

Northwest or the wild salmon on which they depend.

BREEDING & INBREEDING

SeaWorlds vaunted orca breeding program has created a legacy of captive killer whales who areclosely related to each other in a way that would not happen in the wild.

Today many of Tilikums descendants are being bred with each other.

In one case, a young male was allowed to impregnate his own mother, something that is as sociallytaboo in wild whales as it is in most human societies.

Most captive-bred orcas at SeaWorld are unnatural hybridsbizarre mixtures of blood from fish-eating resident whales and mammal eating transient whales from the Pacific, and Icelandic whales from

the North Atlantic.

NO EARLY RETIREMENT

Unlike most other animals that generate profit through entertaining humans, killer whales at SeaWorldand other venues are never allowed to retire. They work literally until they die.

Six killer whales in US parks were captured from the wild, the last survivors of captures that ended in

the 1980s, but their owners refuse to consider allowing them to retire to a sea pen or coastal marinesanctuary where they could be looked after and fed for their remaining years.


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TILIKUM AND DAWN BRANCHEAU

SeaWorld routinely allowed its most senior trainers to put themselves in extremely vulnerablepositions with Tilikum, even though he had already been involved in the death of two people.

Some SeaWorld defenders said the incident was Dawns fault and she should never have been in sucha vulnerable position. But several SeaWorld witnesses at the hearing to overturn the OSHA violation

testified that Dawn did not break protocol that day.

Despite the clear danger of being in shallow water so close to Tilikum, SeaWorld to this day considerswhat Dawn was doing when she died to be dry work instead of water work.

SeaWorld had been clearly warned of the risks in allowing water work. Following a serious incident

at SeaWorld San Diego in 2006 in which a trainer nearly drowned, the California state OSHA wrote: Ifsomeone hasn't been killed already, it is only a matter of time before it does happen.

SeaWorld successfully exerted its considerable political influence to have the death warning redactedfrom the final report that was issued in 2007.

SEAWORLDS DISREGARD FOR EMPLOYEES SAFETY

Two former employees filed sworn affidavits alleging that SeaWorld hid or destroyed documents

sought by federal agents in the investigation of Brancheaus death, and tried to impede otherparts of theinvestigation. (Both whistleblowers subsequently retracted their allegations within a short period of time

of each other.

One of the whistleblowers alleged that senior male trainers at Shamu Stadium had sexually harassedfemale trainers, asking for sexual favors in exchange for more water time with the whales. Whenasked about the matter, SeaWorld spokesman Fred Jacobs did not deny the allegations.

SeaWorld was the subject of a lengthy audit and investigation by the US Department of Labor over

unfair hiring practices. Government inspectors asserted that more than 1000 qualified African-Americanand Hispanic applicants had been turned down for employment.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) cited SeaWorld for a willful violationof the law in the Brancheau incident and said the company had acted with plain indifference to

employee safety.

SeaWorld will likely challenge any negative ruling from its appeal to the OSHA violation, which

would send the case to Washington, DC, where the ongoing process would pit SeaWorlds owner, TheBlackstone Group, against US Labor Secretary Hilda Solis. Blackstones CEO, Stephen Schwarzman, isa major-league supporter of Mitt Romney and once compared Barack Obama to Adolf Hitler.


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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

DAVID KIRBY is the author ofEvidence of Harm, which was aNew York Times bestseller, winner ofthe 2005 Investigative Reporters and Editors award for best book, and a finalist for the New York Public

Library Helen Bernstein Award for Excellence in Journalism, andAnimal Factory, an acclaimed

investigation into the environmental impact of factory farms which NPR compared to Upton Sinclairsclassic work, The Jungle. His latest book,Death at SeaWorldwas previewed byLibrary Journal, which

wrote: Lives are at stake here, and Kirby can be trusted to tell the story, having won a passel of awardsfor his investigate work. Louie Psihoyos, Academy Award winning director ofThe Cove, has called thebook entertaining, engaging -- and enraging.

David Kirby has also been a regular contributor to the Huffington Post since its founding in 2005, hasbeen a professional journalist for more than 20 years. He has written for a number of national magazinesand was a foreign correspondent in Mexico and Central America from 1986-1990, where he covered the

wars in El Salvador and Nicaragua, and covered politics, corruption and natural disasters in Mexico. He

has also done extensive consulting with the United Nations Development Programmes HumanDevelopment Report Office.

Kirby worked for New York City Council President Carol Bellamy as a special assistant for healthcare,cultural affairs and civil rights, followed by employment as chief scheduler to Manhattan Borough

President David N. Dinkins and senior staff adviser to Dinkins successful 1989 run for Mayor of NewYork City. From 1990-1993, Kirby was Director of Public Information at the American Foundation forAIDS Research (AmFAR), where he acted as press spokesman for Chairwoman Elizabeth Taylor, and

witnessed first-hand the inner workings of Congress, the White House and powerful Federal agencies

like the FDA, CDC and NIH.

Kirby has appeared on such national and international venues asMeet the Press, Larry King Live, TheToday Show,NPR, AC360 with Anderson Cooper, MSNBC, BBC Panorama, BBC2, Fox News

Channel, Fox and Friends Weekend, Imus in the Morning, The View, Montel Williams, Air America anddozens of local radio and television stations. Kirby has also been interviewed by, contributed to, and/or

reviewed by outlets such as The New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, Associated Press,

Financial Times, O Magazine, Bloomberg, Newsday, The Lancet, Salon.com, NPR.com and much more.He lives in Brooklyn, NY and can be reached [email protected].
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]:[email protected]://www.huffingtonpost.com/


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PLAYERS in DEATH AT SEAWORLD

Naomi A. Rose, Ph.D. is Senior Scientist for Humane Society International (HSI). She

oversees HSI campaigns to protect wild and captive marine mammals and is a member of the

International Whaling Commissions Scientific Committee. She has published popular andscientific articles, authored book chapters, and lectures annually at several universities. She

participates in workshops and task forces at the international, national and state level. She

received her Ph.D. on the social dynamics of killer whales in 1992 from the University of

California at Santa Cruz.

Jeffrey Ventre, MD is a medical doctor who specializes in Physical Medicine andRehabilitation (PM&R). He worked as a trainer at SeaWorld from 1987 - 1995, spending

seven of the eight years with cetaceans. Although he is now an opponent of captivity his

favorite whales at SeaWorld were Taima and Katina, with whom he performed regularly in

1994 and 1995. In June of 1996 he participated in "Orca Survey" with Ken Balcomb andDr Astrid van Ginneken. Seeing free-ranging killer whales radically altered his

perspective. In 2011 he co-authored a paper with John Jett PhD, which describes the health

issues and decreased lifespans of captive orcas.

John Jett, Ph.D. worked as an orca trainer at Sea World of Florida 1992-1996 and worked

closely with Tilikum, the animal that has now killed three people, including trainer Dawn

Brancheau, whom he knew well. He has B.S. and M.S. degrees in Environmental Science

and Ph.D. in Health and Human Performance with an emphasis on waterway management

and marine mammal conservation issues. He has recently been subpoenaed as an expert

witness to appear in Federal court on behalf of OSHA against Sea World, and is currently aVisiting Research Professor in Environmental Science and Laboratory Manager for the

Biology Department at Stetson.

Samantha Berg holds a B.S. in Animal Science from Cornell University and a Masters

in Acupuncture from The Traditional Acupuncture Institute in Laurel, MD. Sam was

hired at SeaWorld of Florida six months after graduating from college when she was 22-

years-old. Sam worked at the park for 3 1/2 years, from February 1990 to the end of

August 1993 and she was working at Shamu stadium when Tilikum arrived in Orlando

from Sealand of the Pacific. Sam currently owns an Acupuncture Center in Palmer,

Alaska with her husband Kevin. She has appeared on the CBS Early Show, Fox andFriends and on NBC to offer her perspective as an ex-SeaWorld trainer on the ethics of

killer whale captivity and trainer safety. Sam is now opposed to keeping marine

mammals in captivity and feels, for the sake of all the animals she worked with, that it's

important to work to end the practice of keeping these sensitive, intelligent animals inperpetual confinement for the sake of human entertainment and profit.


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Carol Ray earned a B.A. degree in Psychology from Rollins College in Winter Park, FL,

after which she worked for several years training cetaceans at Sea World of Florida. Of

her 3+ years at Sea World (dec 1987- dec 1990), she spent approximately 2 years and 6

months working at Shamu Stadium with orcas, and 6 months at the multi-species Whale

and Dolphin stadium. As a former killer whale trainer who is no longer involved in the

industry, she offers a unique perspective on captivity and marine parks. As a lover of

marine life and an extensive traveler, she cherishes the opportunities she has had toexperience whales and dolphins in their natural environment, around the world, including

but not limited to the Puget Sound, the Sea of Cortez, the Great Barrier Reef, areas

around New Zealand, Hawaii, the Andaman Sea, Polynesia, and many sites in the

Caribbean. After devoting decades of her life to helping children, and families with

children who have developmental and communication delays, she is now delighted to

have the time and opportunity to begin repaying the debt she feels she owes to the

beloved animals she spent time working with.

87480334 death at seaworld press kit

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