T046B1s at TEḴTEḴSEN

July 21, 2026

Photo by: Lauren Laturnus (SFU)

On July 21 our team vset out towards Saturna Island to connect with one of our team members who was stationed there. As we arrived, the T046B1s were making their way towards TEḴTEḴSEN. We all got out and watched the whales from land as they hunted a sea lion in front of us for about 45 minutes. Once they had a successful hunt, they continued northeast, out of the Saturna Vessel Restricted Zone and towards the Strait of Georgia and busy vessel traffic. We got aboard our vessel and monitored from afar until we observed vessels travelling at speed towards the pod. We then raised our whale flag and approached, notifying vessels of their presence and making an effort to keep our relatives of the deep safe from vessel traffic. Once the whales continued into less inhabited waters, we made our way East to conduct compliance monitoring of the Belle Chain Islets fishing closure areas.

All photos are taken with a 200-600 zoom lens.