Humpback Whale Makes Record Migration of Over 8,077 Miles From Colombia to Zanzibar [Video]

In a whale migration of epic proportions, a humpback has been recorded making a journey of more than 8,077 miles from Colombia to Tanzania.

A team of marine ecologists says it’s the longest individual whale migration ever recorded, topping the old record of 6,214 miles.

“Humpback whales have complex behavior, but to find an adult male whale halfway around the world is unexpected,” said co-author of the research Ted Cheeseman, a whale biologist at Southern Cross University, as reported by Science.

Cheeseman explained that, while a whale will sometimes move from one group to a different one nearby, in order to get all the way to Tanzania the humpback would have had to pass through two Atlantic-based groups.

“This is more ‘foreign’ than any humpback previously documented,” Cheeseman noted.

The observation of the whale’s extraordinary journey was enabled by modified facial recognition software that was designed to identify whales by the distinct shapes of their flukes.

…