12-5-14 She Was Energy In Motion

it happened yesterday...on the CTV, Victoria news...they announced a whale was seen floating in the water near a resort at Comox, British Columbia...I grabbed my camera to get a screen shot for reference...

...but it wasn't long before images came of the saddle patch...it was Rhapsody J-32...oh, so sad is all I can say right now...

...she was here on November 29th with the rest of J pod...

...that is the day they disappeared before our eyes...a few days later it was said that J pod was seen passing Victoria, in the later afternoon, heading west...
...Comox is many, many miles to the north on the east side of Vancouver Island...Victoria is on the west side...J pod must have split into their two groups...but we many never know for sure...
note added on 12/6: Capt. Jim did some checking and learned that those who had seen 'J pod' had later realized it was K pod...so with that and with everything else that has occurred it appears that it is more likely that all of J pod had gone north...

...she gave people the gift of her energy and playfulness...

...and of her breaching - of course!...

...you could count on Rhapsody to be seen with certain other whales...Cookie J-38, was one for sure...maybe he was her 'best friend'...though it seemed she had many...

...her last gift might be that of the revealing of information about what is happening to this community......it is hoped that with a necropsy we will know for sure why she died...Ken Balcomb of the Center for Whale Research will be there for that...

note: a bit of 'artist license' was used on my J-32 images today...