Riveting video shows killer whales attacking race yachts: 'Three orcas came straight at us and started hitting the rudders'

Intense video shows the moment that killer whales attacked yachts competing in a race. The orcas rammed, bit, and nudged the boats in the Atlantic Ocean.

A pod of orcas attacked two race yachts competing in the Ocean Race — an international sailing race that started in 1973. The Ocean Race for this year started in January in Alicante, Spain, and concludes in Genova, Italy, at the end of June.

The killer whales attacked Team JAJO of Amsterdam and Mirpuri Trifork Racing of Portugal on Thursday afternoon.

While the boats were sailing in the Atlantic Ocean west of Gibraltar, a pod of orcas became alarmingly aggressive.

There was one orca that rammed the Team JAJO boat. Killer whales pushed up against the boat and bit the rudder.

Video taken from a waterproof camera shows a killer whale repeatedly nudging the rudder.

"Twenty minutes ago we got hit by some orcas," Team JAJO skipper Jelmer van Beek said in a news release. "Three orcas came straight at us and started hitting the rudders. Impressive to see the orcas, beautiful animals, but also a dangerous moment for us as a team."

He added, "We took down the sails and slowed down the boat as quickly as possible and luckily after a few attacks they went away. … This was a scary moment."

There were no reported injuries or damage to the race yachts.

ORCA ENCOUNTER AT GIBRALTAR FOR TEAM JAJO | The Ocean Racewww.youtube.com

On Monday, an orca attacked a seven-ton yacht off the Shetland Islands in Scotland.

Retired Dutch physicist Dr. Wim Rutten said he was fishing for mackerel off the back of the boat when the killer whale started attacking his boat. The orca repeatedly rammed the stern and created "soft shocks" through the aluminum hull, according to Rutten.

"What I felt [was] most frightening was the very loud breathing of the animal," Rutten told the Guardian. "Maybe he just wanted to play. Or look me in the eyes. Or to get rid of the fishing line."

This is said to be the first known killer whale attack in the area.

Captain Dan Kriz, a delivery skipper with more than 20 years of sailing experience, had two worrisome encounters with orcas in the past three years.

"First time, we could hear them communicating under the boat," Kriz told Newsweek. "This time, they were quiet, and it didn't take them that long to destroy both rudders. Looks like they knew exactly what they are doing. They didn't touch anything else."

Kriz called the behavior "unusual."

Last month, several orcas rammed into boats in the Strait of Gibraltar.

Killer whale attacks on boats have tripled in the past two years, according to Grupo de Trabajo Orca Atlántica, a group that researches orcas in the region.

Andrew W. Trites, professor and director of Marine Mammal Research at the University of British Columbia, told CBS News, "Nobody knows why this is happening. My idea, or what anyone would give you, is informed speculation. It is a total mystery, unprecedented."

Dr. Alfredo López, of the Grupo de Trabajo Orca Atlántica, said: "We know that many boats use fishing lines from the stern to fish and it is a motivation for orcas, they come to examine them."

Lopez said the focus on the boats' rudders could be because they previously "had a bad experience and try to stop the boat so as not to repeat it."

Orcas are part of the cetaceans group, which also includes whales, dolphins, and porpoises.

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