Longman’s beaked whales in Hawai‘i

We’ve only had a single sighting with Longman’s beaked whales (Indopacetus pacificus) – a group of ~35 individuals offshore of Kona in August 2007. In spite of this, there have been numerous likely reports of large groups of Longman’s beaked whales off the island of Hawai‘i and in offshore waters around the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, along with a single stranding in March 2010. While this species remains elusive for the moment, we hope to encounter them again in the future!

Below is a slideshow featuring images of Longman’s beaked whales from Hawai‘i. You can hover your mouse over the images for more information. 

A Longman’s beaked whale off Kona in August 2007. Despite searching in the area for two hours after spotting this group we were unable to re-locate them. To our knowledge this is the first confirmed sighting of this species off the main Hawaiian Islands and only the second confirmed sighting of this species in Hawaiian waters.
Longman’s beaked whales off Kona in August 2007, showing the characteristic beak of one individual.
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References on Longman’s beaked whales: 

  • Baird, R.W. 2016. The lives of Hawai‘i’s dolphins and whales: natural history and conservation. University of Hawai‘i Press, Honolulu, Hawai‘i. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780824865931. 
  • Rankin, S., S. Baumann-Pickering, T. Yack, and J. Barlow. 2011. Description of sounds recorded from Longman’s beaked whale, Indopacetus pacificus. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 130. EL339-EL344.
  • West, K.L., D. Rotstein, K.M. Robertson, S. Dennison, G. Levine, N. Davis, D. Schofield, C.W. Potter, and B. Jensen. 2012. A Longman’s beaked whale (Indopacetus pacificus) strands in Maui, Hawaii, with first case of morbillivirus in the central Pacific. Marine Mammal Science 29(4):767-776.

All photos are copyrighted and should not be used without permission.

Updated May 2023. 

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Got photos? We have photo-ID catalogs for several Hawaiian cetacean species! If you have photos that you would be willing to share, you can learn how to submit those to us at this link, or contact us at Hawaii@cascadiaresearch.org