Arabic version: «سقوط الحوت» يثير تساؤلات حول بيولوجيا الحيتان

According to ABC News, the film Whalefall, based on Daniel Kraus’s 2023 novel, follows scuba diver Jay Gardiner, played by Austin Abrams, after he is swallowed by a sperm whale while entangled with a giant squid. The character has 60 minutes to escape before his scuba tank oxygen runs out.

Dr Vanessa Pirotta, a lecturer and whale scientist in Macquarie University’s Marine Predator Research Group, said a person could potentially go down a sperm whale’s throat because it is a toothed whale. However, she said it is unknown whether someone could survive. Humans are not part of a whale’s diet, she said.

Pirotta said the movie’s feeding scenario is unlikely because sperm whales generally feed at least about a kilometre beneath the ocean surface, where pressure is immense. She also questioned how a giant squid could be followed to shallow water. At such depths, she said, a human would die and implode.

A whale that encountered a person wearing scuba equipment might recognise that something was wrong, Pirotta said. She noted that baleen whales have sometimes made contact with swimmers or kayakers before opening their mouths and ejecting them. To her understanding, there has never been a human swallowing by a whale.

The scientist said sperm whale stomachs contain acids and may hold undigested squid beaks. She added that a scuba tank could cause harm to a whale if it reached the stomach. The film’s title also refers to whalefall, the process in which a dead whale eventually sinks and carries nutrients and carbon to the ocean floor.

Pirotta said whales are environmentally and economically important, including through the movement of iron around the ocean known as the iron pump. Whalefall is now playing in Australian cinemas.