Orca attack horror as family rescued from sinking yacht after SOS call | World | News

Dramatic footage has captured the rescue of a family of five including three children after their yacht was sunk in a new orca attack. A Portuguese Air Force military helicopter winch the survivors off a fishing vessel which had come to their rescue after their boat was rammed by a pod of the cetaceans and began taking on water.

As a precaution, they were flown by chopper to the hospital. The saga unfolded late Friday, roughly 55 miles south-east of Peniche, a 75-minute drive north of Lisbon. Three children aged eight, 10 and 12 were on board the French-flagged 36ft-long yacht, named locally as Ti’fare, with their parents when it was attacked. Their mum and dad managed to send an SOS and scramble into a liferaft before the vessel, understood to have been left with a breached hull after being rammed, started sinking.

A Peniche-based fishing boat named Silmar responded to the alert as the military were mobilised.

The Portuguese Air Force confirmed the rescue yesterday, sharing footage of the moment the survivors were airlifted onto a chopper from Silmar and taken away for a medical check-up.

A spokesman said: “During the night of October 10, the Air Force’s EH-101 Merlin helicopter was called into action to rescue five people who were on board a boat sailing more than 50 km from Peniche.

“The sailboat, carrying a couple and their three children, was attacked by a group of killer whales, which damaged the vessel, causing it to take on water.

“After the incident, the five people abandoned the vessel using a liferaft and were later picked up by a fishing boat that was in the vicinity.

“To support the rescue mission, the Air Force activated the EH-101 Merlin helicopter from Squadron 751 – ‘Pumas’, which took off from Air Base Number Six in Montijo at 8.45pm on Friday.

“Once the rescue was successfully completed, the Air Force helicopter returned to BA6 at around 11pm.

 “The rescue mission was activated by the Air Force’s Lisbon Search and Rescue Coordination Centre, following a request for activation from the coordinating entity, the Portuguese Navy’s Lisbon Maritime Search and Rescue Centre.”

In addition to the Air Force helicopter, a Navy frigate and a lifeboat from the Peniche Port Authority were also mobilised.

The family at the centre of the latest drama involving orcas had reportedly left the town of Lorient in Brittany, western France, on September 29 and stopped in La Coruna in Galicia and the Portuguese city of Porto before travelling further south.

They are understood to now be receiving support from French consular officials after being allowed to leave hospital.

Last month a pod of orcas sank a yacht carrying five people, including a British national, near Fonte da Telha beach just south of Lisbon.

Footage shows an orca repeatedly striking the Oceanview sailboat, which belonged to the Nautic Squad Club, and it disappearing under the water before it could be saved after the crew were rescued.

The same day, the same pod of orcas attacked another nearby boat called Nova Vida.

The Norwegian sailors on board told afterwards how they were able to save the vessel by installing an emergency rudder and pry it enough to get them back to Cascais, 10 nautical miles away, after being rammed.

Between 2020 and 2023 there were reportedly around 500 attacks by orcas. No humans have been injured, but 20% of the vessels targeted have been damaged, and several were lost.

A number of incidents have occurred in the Gibraltar Straits, although over the past few weeks, the area north and south of Lisbon has been in the news over orca attacks there.

Up until Saturday, Portugal’s Maritime Authority said 61 warnings were sent out to sailors alerting them about interactions with the mammals off the country’s coast, compared with just 45 throughout last year.