No, whales do not eat people; they primarily eat small aquatic lifeforms such as fish, squid, and krill, and a few dolphin species are even known to eat marine mammals such as seals, sea lions, walruses, and whales.
Still, they are not known for consuming or eating people. Despite the many stories in mythology and history, there aren’t any cases of whales consuming humans or their body parts.
Many whale species are relatively friendly and curious about humans and rarely attack humans unless provoked or threatened.
In numerous situations, whales and dolphins have been observed coming up to boats or close to the shoreline out of curiosity.
Divers have also been observed swimming up to some large marine mammals and touching them.
Other shy or less social species stay away and remain hidden to avoid detection and maintain a safe distance.
In captivity, many species get along with each other and respond well to their trainers.
However, it has been argued that keeping some species in captivity may lead to aggression and unpredictable behavior because whales and dolphins often need open sea life and a healthy social structure.
Note: While most large marine mammals aren’t held in captivity, a few smaller marine mammals, such as the beluga whale, bottlenose dolphin, and killer whale, may be found at marine aquariums.
In rare cases, a few accounts of killer whales (killer whales are dolphins) in captivity attacking their trainers, leading to the trainers either being injured or, in rare cases, even death.
Still, there aren’t any known cases of killer whales or cetaceans eating or consuming people.
In situations where a killer whale has attacked a trainer, these attacks usually consist of the whale grabbing onto a trainer’s arm, leg, or hair and pulling them under the water.
For the most part, killer whales are naturally very social and surprisingly non-aggressive toward humans, especially those in the wild.
There are only a handful of cases where a killer whale attacked a human in the wild, and in these situations, the killer whale appears to have mistaken a human for their regular food.
Once the killer whale realized it was not their typical food, it would stop its pursuit and leave humans alone.
What about large whales?
When you look at other species, such as the great whales (from the baleen whale suborder), which can grow to enormous sizes, they may appear to eat or swallow humans due to their massive size.
The most massive whale, the blue whale, is also the largest living mammal on earth, measuring 60 – 90 ft. long on average.
While they are the world’s largest animal, the blue whale eats a diet primarily consisting of krill and occasionally fish and other small aquatic life forms much smaller than humans.
Like the blue whale, most large whales consume much smaller food than humans.
They also have baleen plates instead of teeth, so they can’t even chew their food, which in many cases would be necessary even to attempt to eat a human.
If you’re wondering whether or not they can swallow a human whole, it’s interesting to point out that these large animals’ throat is relatively small compared to their body.
For example, in most cases, a blue whale’s throat is estimated to be no larger than a foot, which is way too small to swallow a human.
One of the only whales believed to consume a human is the sperm whale, which has a larger than average throat than other whale species.
While these marine mammals have large throats (which they use to swallow giant squid), they often hunt for food depths much deeper than a human can dive and may swim as deep as 3,000 ft. to search for a giant squid.
As a result, the likelihood of a sperm whale swallowing a human is very low.
Intelligence, diet, and traits
In addition to being non-threatening (for the most part), many whale and dolphin species are also brilliant.
They have complex social structures that are sometimes compared to the social structure of humans and elephants.
These whales can often be found traveling in large groups or pods and following other whales in the pod, depending on that whale’s sex, maturity, and level of authority or dominance.
This hierarchy brings order and structure to the group and can be highly beneficial during foraging and hunting.
Numerous species are known to hunt for prey in groups.
They will use vocal communication, visual signals, and echolocation to organize attacks on fish and other types of prey to isolate and immobilize their food so that they can take turns consuming their prey.
When it comes to food, whales consume various prey such as fish, squid, octopus, krill, benthic organisms, crab larvae, copepods, and other crustaceans.
In contrast, killer whales may consume these same types of prey, plus seals, sea lions, penguins, walruses, marine birds, sea turtles, dolphins, and whales. As with the killer whale species, false killer whales are also known to attack and consume various marine mammals.
While some species are highly social other whale species are known to live and hunt independently.
For instance, some of the larger whale species prefer to stay in smaller pods or travel and hunt for food by themselves.
They still communicate with other whales during migration periods or mating.
Nevertheless, they are less social than the smaller species, focusing on community, team foraging, and group activities.
Theories
It isn’t fully understood why whales do not hunt or eat humans.
Numerous theories and ideas have tried to explain their apparent lack of interest in human flesh.
Some have speculated that we do not taste appealing.
Therefore, animals such as killer whales aren’t interested in attacking or consuming people.
In contrast, others speculate that we do not resemble their regular diet, so they are less likely to try and hunt us.
There are also theories that killer whales are intelligent and have chosen not to consume people as a conscious decision.
In most cases, humans do not come into close enough contact with animals such as sperm whales or killer whales in the wild to even consider them a threat.