Returning to work with Keto, Martinez tried a move where he rode the orca into the pool before sliding up onto the stage. However, Keto dove too deeply, forcing Martinez to swim back on his own. However, it seemed like the orca was blocking his trainer’s path to the stage.

Martínez’s Final Moments

Martinez was instructed to swim slowly to another pool while a colleague distracted Keto. However, Keto went straight for Martinez, slamming into him, forcing him underwater, and violently toying with his body. Eventually, other trainers managed to call Keto into a different pool so they could retrieve Martinez, who had suffered fatal injuries. Tragically, his death predated Dawn Brancheau’s fatal attack in SeaWorld by only a few months.

The Prior Orca Attack at Loro Parque

On 2007, 29-year-old German orca trainer Claudia Vollhardt was hospitalized after an attack from Tekoa the killer whale. Vollhardt was working at Loro Parque’s Orca Ocean, rehearsing a trick with Tekoa where the orca pushed her feet with its snout as they swam together. Instead, Tekoa slammed into the woman from beneath, grabbed her arm in its mouth, and pulled her underwater several times before freeing her. At the time, the Loro Parque spokeswoman called the incident an accident because “the whale did not bite her. If it had, she would have lost her arm.”

The End of SeaWorld?

Ever since the release of the documentary Blackfish in 2013, marine parks have been under intense public scrutiny. Orcas in captivity have higher mortality rates compared to their wild counterparts. They are separated from their families and they would otherwise stay together for life. And they are confined to a tank instead of migrating over great distances in the ocean. The Whale Sanctuary Project is an organization working to create large seaside sanctuaries for rescued cetaceans like Keto who can experience this freedom for the first time while still receiving human care.