Keiko the orca's Oregon odyssey: From 'Free Willy' to wild waters

It has been more than 28 years since Keiko landed with a splash in Oregon. 

Keiko who, you may ask?

Keiko was a male orca captured in the Atlantic Ocean near Iceland in 1979 as a 2-year-old. He was sold to the Icelandic Aquarium in Hafnarfjörður soon after.

At the time, he was named Siggi, with the name Kago given to him later.

In 1982, he was sold to Marineland in Ontario, Canada, where he began performing for the public for the first time. He was sold to Reino Aventura, an amusement park in Mexico City, Mexico, in 1985.

It was in Mexico that he was given the name "Keiko," a feminine Japanese name that means "lucky one.” At the time, he was reportedly 10 feet long and was housed in a tank intended for dolphins. Adult Icelandic killer whales typically are 19 to 22 feet long.

In 1993 the orca portrayed Willy in the movie Free Willy. The film grossed nearly $8 million domestically during its opening weekend and went on to gross an estimated $153 million.

After a large public outcry, Warner Bros. and the International Marine Mammal Project in 1996 collaborated to figure out a way to return Keiko to the wild. 

The Free Willy-Keiko Foundation was created and with funds raised in part from donations from millions of school children, donated $7 million to construct facilities to return Keiko to health, with the hope of returning him to the wild. Reino Aventura in Mexico donated the whale to the foundation.

On January 7, 1996, Keiko arrived at the Oregon Coast Aquarium in Newport and became its star attraction. 

“A cheer went up as Keiko — illuminated by underwater spotlights — made his first trip through the blue-green water,” of the aquarium according to a story in The Register-Guard. 

“Ooh, look at him show off for us,” said one onlooker peering through the observation window.

In 1997, I visited the aquarium with my daughter, who was less than a year old at the time. The two of us watched from behind a row of spectators at one of the tank viewing windows. My daughter hung in a shoulder sling in front of me wearing a white onesie with a hood. 

Keiko, with his signature droopy dorsal fin, swam in a large circle, hugging the walls inside his tank. As the crowd thinned in front of us, I moved closer to the window for a better look. As the orca made another pass, I saw his eye roll in his head to track my daughter and me as he swam past. At that moment, instead of continuing on his previous track, he made a sharp turn and circled back, coming to a stop directly in front of us. 

For several minutes the three of us stared at each other. The orca floating still in the water with his nose pressed to the glass and me with my daughter, our eyes wide in amazement. 

The group around us began to laugh nervously. I joked, “Keiko seems to think my daughter is a snack or something?” A woman next to me offered, “I think he just really likes kids.” 

Whatever was going through Keiko’s mind, it was a magical moment for my family that I will never forget. 

Keiko continued to live in Newport as his trainers worked to prepare him for reintegration into the wild. An estimated 2.5 million people saw him during his nearly three-year stay.  

In September of 1998, Keiko left Oregon and was flown to Iceland. After four years of rehabilitation there, in 2002 he became the first captive orca to be fully released back into the ocean.

Unfortunately, the reintroduction did not go as planned.

After release, Keiko initially joined a pod of other orcas but did not assimilate with the group. He later arrived alone in Norway's Skålvik Fjord, apparently seeking contact with humans.

On December 12, 2003, Keiko died of pneumonia in a bay in Norway at the age of 27.

The Associated Press, reporting on Keiko's death quoted a spokesperson for the Humane Society of the United States saying the organization that helped to relocate the orca was sad at his passing but believed they gave him a chance to be in the wild.

Contact photographer Chris Pietsch atchris.pietsch@registerguard.com, or follow him on Twitter@ChrisPietsch and Instagram@chrispietsch