ORLANDO, Fla. — Shamu is big business at SeaWorld, which owns more killer whales than anyone else in the world and builds the orca image into its multimillion-dollar brand, and the killing of a trainer this week won’t change that.
Shamu shows will resume today, three days after a 6-ton bull orca dragged Dawn Brancheau underwater to her death at the end of a show in Orlando, SeaWorld Parks and Entertainment president Jim Atchison said Friday. But staff at the for-profit parks in Orlando, San Antonio and San Diego won’t get back in the water with the hulking ocean predators until SeaWorld and a panel of outside experts complete a top-to-bottom review of how the company handles orcas.
“We have created an extraordinary opportunity for people to get an up-close, personal experience and be inspired and connect with marine life in a way they cannot do anywhere else in the world,” Atchison said, “and for that we will make no apologies.”
The timing of the killer whales’ return to performances reflects just what the sleek mammals mean to SeaWorld. The private equity firm The Blackstone Group bought SeaWorld last fall for about $2.7 billion from Anheuser-Busch InBev in a deal that included two Busch Gardens theme parks and several other attractions.
No animal is more valuable to that operation than Tilikum, the largest orca in captivity, which now has been involved in the deaths of two trainers.
Captured nearly 30 years ago off Iceland, Tilikum has grown into the alpha male of captive killer whales, his value as a stud impossible to pin down.
It’s legal to capture orcas in the U.S. with a permit, though one hasn’t been requested since the 1980s, according to the National Marine Fisheries Service.
“Really, you can’t buy them,” said Dennis Speigel, president of International Theme Park Services, a consulting firm. He put the market value of an individual whale at up to $10 million.
