Overview

• Scientists have recorded 14 gray whale deaths in the Bay Area so far in 2025, including five found over the past week.
• Photo-identification teams tallied 33 individual gray whale sightings in the Bay this year, up from just four in 2024.
• Necropsies confirmed three vessel strikes among the fatalities, while most recent deaths remain undetermined due to decomposition or inaccessible recovery sites.
• This year’s Bay death toll matches numbers seen during the 2019–2023 NOAA-declared unusual mortality event that cut the Eastern North Pacific population by 45%.
• Researchers are exploring whether climate-driven declines in Arctic food supplies are causing whales to linger in the Bay before resuming their northward migration.