Yet another sailing boat has been damaged by an ‘encounter with orcas’ off the Portuguese coast. The latest incident, around seven kms southwest of Cabo Espichel left a French yacht adrift. The crew, both French, were unharmed, explains the coastguard’s report. The boat has been towed to Cascais marina where it will undergo repairs. This latest ‘interaction’ happened at night, again not unknown. Commentaries on the Orca Attack Facebook page include the wry comment: “I think the term interaction is very quaint when this was effectively an attack. Anyone who likes to use the term interaction might like to throw themselves into the water and interact with these orcas. It would certainly be an interesting experience”. This led to the comparison from another member of the page, who said: “If you went for a walk or a bicycle ride in the country and a wild boar leapt on you and started to bite you, would you call this an interaction?”. It is only a three months since a similar inaction sent one French boat to the bottom of the sea off Viana do Castelo.
