Hear their voice
Drowned out by boats
Give killer whales a voice
Killer whales live in a world of sound. Their calls maintain family bonds, coordinate movements, and sustain the cultures that safeguard their survival. But humans keep making the oceans louder, and killer whales are being silenced.
Help us protect them
To protect killer whales from noise, we first need to understand what they are saying – and our research is the best tool we have for doing this. Help us launch our 2026 field season. We need to raise $77,500 by June 30th to make this happen.
Phase Two: We’re half way there
Video taken under licence.
Northern Resident and Transient killer whales are threatened
Different ecotypes of killer whales inhabit the Pacific Northwest, each with their own social structures, distinct diets, and behaviours. The Residents eat fish, while the Transients (also known as Bigg’s), are marine mammal-eaters. Underwater noise is the common thread that impacts them all.
Killer whale habitat health is deteriorating
For over a century, vessel traffic has been steadily increasing, flooding their habitat with noise. It disrupts communication, reduces the distance over which groups can detect one another, masks echolocation needed for detecting prey, and may drive species away from key feeding grounds. In extreme cases, it can cause temporary or permanent hearing damage, and even lead to death.
Sound is survival
Imagine a mother couldn’t hear her child’s call. Or you’re in the dark, following your friends, when suddenly, they’re gone – their voices fade to nothing, devoured by the roar of an engine. You’re lost.
Killer whales are social and cultural creatures
Killer whales are not that different from us. They rely on one another to live. They have dialects that are used to identify each pod, even each matriline, similar to regional accents. They grieve. They celebrate. Female killer whales experience menopause. They rely on one another to take care of their calves. Culture is an essential part of killer whale survival. And a healthy soundscape is fundamental for their culture to exist and be transmitted.
Phase one is complete – now help us go further!
Last December, Raincoast launched the first phase of our killer whale communication campaign in support of foundational acoustic and behavioural annotation and data analyses. Thanks to your generosity, we were able to attain our goal in only a couple of weeks.
Hear their voice
Drowned out by boats
Phase one complete
2026 field season
Our team of scientists is now preparing for phase 2: an ambitious 2026 field season aboard Raincoast’s Sailing Vessel Achiever. These extended periods of time at sea are necessary to collect the data needed to advance this foundational research that will ultimately allow us to protect killer whales from underwater noise.
Science is a team sport
Last summer, researchers from Raincoast Conservation Foundation, Earth Species Project, and Icelandic Orca Project completed a highly successful pilot season in British Columbia. We tested and refined our multimodal workflow, demonstrated the feasibility of collecting synchronized datasets under challenging field conditions, and validated our analytical methods. This pilot season laid the foundation for a scalable and long-term research program to ultimately protect killer whales’ social lives.
We’re half way there!
We’re thrilled to announce that one of our partners has provided half of the funds required for this marine expedition to take place. That means we have a little over 3 months to raise the remaining $77,500.
Your contribution directly fuels science, quite literally helping get the vessel, our researchers, and our equipment into the field so we can continue advancing this groundbreaking work.
Applied conservation science saves lives
We’re bringing together decades of field biology and ecological knowledge of the whales with new analytical tools to understand killer whale communication and amplify their voice.
By integrating synchronized drone footage, underwater acoustic recordings, and time-stamped behavioral observations, we aim to uncover how killer whales use sound to coordinate movements, share prey, and maintain social bonds. Our objective is to understand how noise pollution interferes with these processes so we can mitigate the impact it has on killer whales.
Listen, decode, act
Together, these datasets allow us to link sound to behaviour with unprecedented precision. With expert support from Earth Species Project, we apply advanced AI-based analytical tools to help us interpret this enormous multimodal dataset, identifying patterns across thousands of calls and relationships between calls and behaviour.
Defend their home, protect our ocean
Out-of-earshot can’t mean out-of-mind. Like us, killer whales are cultural, profoundly social, and essential to the health of our coast. We can’t let them go unheard.