Kalia

Kalia. Photo courtesy of hunder.d.photography.

### Half-Siblings

Takara, *Nakai*, *Halyn*, *Unna's Stillborn (2006)*, *Kayla's Miscarriage (2007)*, *Unna's Miscarriage (2009)*, Makani

### Aunts & Uncles

*Baby Shamu II*, *Kandu V's Stillborn (1986)*, *Katerina*, *Kahana's Miscarriage (1990)*, Takara, *Kenau's Unborn Calf (1991)*, *Samoa's Stillborn (1992)*, *Taku*, *Haida II's Calf (1994)*, Keto, *Unna*, *Kalina's Stillborn (1997)*, Tuar, Ikaika, *Skyla*, Nalani, Makaio

### Nieces & Nephews

Kohana, Trua, Nalani, Sakari, Adán, *Victoria*, *Takara's Miscarriage (2012)*, Kamea, *Kyara*, *Ula*

### Cousins

*Kohana*, Trua, *Unna's Stillborn (2006)*, Nalani, *Unna's Miscarriage (2009)*, Sakari, Adán, *Takara's Miscarriage (2012)*, *Victoria*, Kamea, *Kyara*, *Ula*

Kalia (*pronounced kaa-LEE-ah*) is a 19-year-old female hybrid killer whale who lives at SeaWorld San Diego. She was born there tail-first at 9:22 am PST on December 21st, 2004. Her mother is Kasatka, an Icelandic killer whale, and her father is Keet, a 75% Icelandic, 25% Southern resident killer whale, making Kalia 87.5% Icelandic, 12.5% Southern resident. Following the death of her mother in 2017, Kalia became the dominant female of the San Diego pod alongside Shouka.

## Birth and Early Life

On the morning of December 21st, 2004, Kalia's flukes began to emerge. While Kasatka was in labor, the other whales at the park were incredibly vocal. After about 2 hours of labor, at 9:22 am PST, Kalia was born. Her mother rushed to help her to the surface, and she soon took her first breath.   At the time of Kalia's birth, 7 other whales lived at the park: her mother, her older brother, 2 young males named Splash and Sumar, Orkid and Corky II, 2 adult females, and Ulises, an adult male.

By the next day, Kasatka had already taught Kalia how to navigate through gates, and the other whales were showing lots of interest in the new baby.

When Kalia was young, she became very ill, and had to be treated extensively for weeks. This caused her to be more distrusting of trainers. She spent most of her early years on and off medication.

## Life at SeaWorld San Diego

### Motherhood

In early 2013, Kalia's younger brother was finally born. He was named Makani.  Kalia was present for his birth  and she often spent time with him. Kalia and Makani eventually became very close.

In the summer following Makani's birth, Kalia and Ulises mated multiple times. At some point Kalia was also artificially inseminated with his sperm. Not long after, Kalia became pregnant. It was unclear is she conceived naturally or not.  That same summer, plans were made to move her to SeaWorld San Antonio, and the plans were seemingly very far along, although her move was ultimately canceled.

Although SeaWorld tried to keep the pregnancy a secret for as long as possible, by April of 2014 rumors that Kalia was pregnant were beginning to circulate online.  In mid-April of 2014, video footage was uploaded to YouTube that showed Kalia receiving an ultrasound.  Finally, on April 29th, 2014, SeaWorld confirmed Kalia's pregnancy.

On November 30th trainers noticed that Kalia's body temperature had dropped by 1 degree. The following day Kalia stopped eating. As Kalia had been already pregnant for about 17 months, trainers suspected that the birth was imminent. Finally, on December 2nd, 2014,  on a cold,  stormy morning just weeks before her 10th birthday, Kalia went into labor. Trainers first noticed that the calf's flukes had emerged at 10:20 am. Kasatka, Kalia's mother, was present during her labor and diligently stayed by her daughter's side the entire time. Makani and Nakai were also there. After over 2 hours of labor, at 12:34 pm, the calf was born. Kasatka immediately rushed to escort her new grand-daughter to the surface for her first breathe of air, and Kalia followed behind her just seconds later. Although the calf hit the wall of the tank almost immediately after birth, she was not injured. Within a few minutes Kalia's calf was safely swimming between Kalia, Kasatka and Makani, and she was nursing just a few hours after that.

On December 18th, 2014, it was revealed that Kalia's calf was a female.  On January 21st, 2015, SeaWorld announced on their Facebook page that they were holding a vote for the name of the baby. The choices were "Amaya", an Arabic name that means "night rain", "Kissa", an African name that means "first born daughter", and "Nasia", a Greek name that means "immortal".  The name "Amaya" won by a landslide, and her name was officially announced on January 23rd, 2015.

At just a few days old Amaya was already able to swim through gates with her mother. Kasatka was still staying near her daughter, and she even took turns swimming with Amaya while Kalia rested.  At just about 2 weeks old Amaya was ready to make brief appearances in shows alongside her mother.  She quickly showed herself to be independent calf and a strong swimmer even from a very early age.  She was introduced to some of the parks other whales, such as Orkid, at less than a month old.  Amaya even started to try fish around the same time.  By the time she was a month and a half old Amaya was comfortable swimming on her own away from her mother.  By 2 months old Amaya was spending more time playing with her uncle and was even interacting with guests.

### The Death of Kasatka

In 2008, Kasatka developed bacterial pneumonia. Although she survived, the pneumonia became chronic, and she would live with it for the rest of her life.  In 2016, Kasatka's health started to significantly decline. She began to develop skin discoloration on her lower jaw.  In August of 2016, SeaWorld announced that they were treating Kasatka for a respiratory infection, and that she was receiving new treatment for it. Vets even made a custom nebulizer for Kasatka.  Despite the medication and intensive treatments her health continued to get worse, and in 2017 she developed severe skin lesions across her body.    By August 15th, 2017, Kasatka's quality of life was deteriorating, and SeaWorld vets made the decision to euthanize her. Kasatka passed away in the medical pool at 8:15 pm PST surrounded by her caretakers and pod.

### Stepping Up

Following Kasatka's death, the social structure of the San Diego pod changed drastically. Kasatka had been the matriarch, and all of the whales were deeply affected by her loss. Her family was hit especially hard. Although the social hierarchy fluctuated at first, Kalia and Shouka eventually became the dominant females at the park.  Kalia and Makani became even closer after Kasatka's death.

### A New Normal

In late 2019, a novel coronavirus disease known as "COVID-19" was discovered, and it began to spread rapidly across the world. In March of 2020 the World Health Organization declared that it had become a pandemic.  As the disease began to spread in the United States many people, including staff at SeaWorld San Diego, started to wear masks.  Masks were a new experience for the all of the whales and, like many other animals, they likely had to get used to trainers wearing them at first.  In March of 2020, SeaWorld San Diego was closed down to prevent the spread of COVID. Although they hoped to be open again soon,  the park remained closed for several months. During this time shows did not occur and the killer whales did not have access to guests. Although SeaWorld San Diego opened back up again in August of 2020,  they were forced to close again because of COVID in December.  SeaWorld opened up once again about 2 months later in February of 2021 and remained open after that.

### Losing Her Family

On the afternoon of August 19th, 2021, Amaya unexpectedly passed away  from an unspecified gastro-intestinal disease.  Although the loss of Amaya reportedly affected all of the whales deeply, it seemed to hit Kalia and Makani especially hard. Immediately after Amaya's death Kalia isolated herself and would only let Makani approach her.  According to a staff member, Kalia was vocalizing "mournfully" following her daughter's death. On August 21st, Kalia let Shouka be with her.  The day after that Ulises, Nakai, and Orkid joined her as well.  By August 27th, Kalia and the other whales were starting to return to normal.

Late in the evening on August 4th, 2022, almost exactly a year since the death of Amaya, Nakai passed away from an unspecified case of bacterial infection.

## Trivia

* "Kalia" is a name of Hawaiian origin meaning "waited for." It is also the name of a type of flowering tree native to Hawaii, called Kaliʻa.
* Other names considered for Kalia were Akuah, Noelle, Makai, Mele, Nuar, and Tehya.

## Galleries

* **Photos** of Kalia
* **Videos** of Kalia

## Transfer History

*Kalia has never been transferred out of SeaWorld San Diego.*

## References

1. ↑ "Kasatka Giving Birth to Kalia" by XxIStillBelievexX on YouTube
2. ↑ "A' Killer' Birth In San Diego"
3. ↑ "Kasatka & 1-day-old Kalia - Clips & Baby Presentation (December 2004)" by TessOrca on YouTube
4. ↑ "SeaWorld Orca Profile - Killer Whale Kalia 2010"
5. ↑ "Orca Born At SeaWorld"
6. ↑ "Kasatka Giving Birth to Makani" by XxIStillBelievexX on YouTube
7. ↑ "Makani & Kalia and the Bucket" by EchoBeluga on YouTube
8. ↑ "Kalia and Makani at SeaWorld San Diego, California in 2013" by thesupremestar on YouTube
9. ↑ "Let's Talk About Whale Sex – and SeaWorld's Fight for Their Right to Have It"
10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 "Former trainers decry possible orca pregnancy at SeaWorld"
11. ↑ "Kalia's Pregnancy: Ultrasound Footage" by CetusCetus on YouTube
12. ↑ "SeaWorld Says San Diego Killer Whale Is Pregnant"
13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 "Kalia's Calf is Born! | SeaWorld San Diego" by SeaWorld San Diego on YouTube
14. ↑ December 2014 Weather in San Diego — Graph
15. ↑ "Baby killer whale born at SeaWorld"
16. ↑ "Kalia's Baby Gender Reveal! | SeaWorld San Diego" by SeaWorld San Diego on YouTube
17. ↑ "Do you want to help(...)" by SeaWorld on Facebook"
18. ↑ "Kalia's Baby Has a Name! | SeaWorld San Diego" by SeaWorld San Diego on YouTube
19. ↑ "SeaWorld Vote Picks ‘Amaya’ as Name for Killer Whale Calf"
20. ↑ "Kalia's Baby (5 Days Old) and Makani's Mirror" by LawoftheClaw on YouTube
21. ↑ "Kalia, Amaya, Kasatka, and Makani Side by Side (12/18/14)" by EchoBeluga on YouTube
22. ↑ "Kalia, Amaya, Kasatka, and Makani 12-30-14" by RukatheBlackfish on YouTube
23. ↑ "Orkid, Makani, Kalia, Amaya, and Kasatka at the Underwater Viewing (12/23/14)" by EchoBeluga on YouTube
24. ↑ "Kalia shares fish with Amaya at SeaWorld San Diego 12-30-14" by RuketheOrca on YouTube
25. ↑ "Amaya, Makani, Kalia, and Kasatka 1-30-15" by RukatheBlackfish on YouTube"
26. ↑ "Kids playing with killer whale babies Seaworld 2015.2" by Heather Sage on YouTube
27. ↑ "Join us for Kasatka's daily(...)" SeaWorld on Facebook.
28. ↑ "Nakai and Kasatka Rolling (6/23/16)" by EchoBeluga on YouTube
29. ↑ "SeaWorld’s experts have been treating(...)" SeaWorld (SeaWorld) on Twitter
30. ↑ "💕 #kasatka #longway #home #seaworldsandiego(...)" Hayley (tillitime) on Instagram
31. ↑ "What We Need to Learn From the Death of Kasatka, the Orca Captive at SeaWorld"
32. ↑ "SeaWorld Stock Sinks Amid Federal Probes; Care of Key Orca Kasatka Debated"
33. ↑ "Kasatka"
34. ↑ "SeaWorld Euthanizes Killer Whale Kasatka; Matriarch Had Lung Disease"
35. ↑ "LIVE, UP CLOSE, POOLSIDE AND VIRTUALLY, SEAWORLD’S ORCAS AWE AND INSPIRE GUESTS EVERY DAY"
36. ↑ "Timeline: WHO's COVID-19 response"
37. ↑ "10/03/2020: SeaWorld San Diego's Orca Encouter during COVID19 at Spooktacular (4k) - Full Show @ 1pm" by Mr. & Mrs. Theme Park on YouTube
38. ↑ "Virtual Visit: Marine Mammal Mask(…)" New England Aquarium on Facebook
39. ↑ "San Diego Zoo, SeaWorld Closing Amid COVID-19 Pandemic"
40. ↑ "SeaWorld San Diego set to reopen Friday on limited basis with Zoo Days"
41. ↑ "SeaWorld San Diego closes again due to stay-at-home order"
42. ↑ "SeaWorld San Diego Set to Re-Open Feb. 6 After Temporary Pandemic Closure"
43. ↑ "6-Year-Old Orca Dies at SeaWorld San Diego"
44. ↑ MARINE MAMMAL DATA SHEET 01/07/2015
45. ↑ Conversation with an anonymous staff member from August 20th (transcript)
46. ↑ Conversation with an anonymous staff member from August 21st (transcript)
47. ↑ Conversation with an anonymous staff member from August 22nd (transcript)
48. ↑ Conversation with an anonymous staff member from August 27th (transcript)
49. ↑ Name Doctor - Kalia - Name Meaning, Origin, Popularity, and Related Names