Orcas had a pretty good year: Today So Far

• Status update on orcas in the Salish Sea.
• King County Boys and Girls Club is not deterred by fear.
• Washington sends task force to Hawaii.

This post originally appeared in KUOW's Today So Far newsletter for Aug. 14, 2023.

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Orcas are having a pretty decent year in the Salish Sea. The southern resident group has added two new members, and no deaths have been reported by whale watchers. According to Michael Weiss with the Center for Whale Research, it is "rare" for local orca populations to not lose some members in a year. So that's good news. On the other hand, the two new babies are actually fewer than a group of orcas this size should generally be producing each year. That hasn't happened around here for a while.

Boys and Girls Club of King County is not going to let last month's shooting at one of its outreach events stop it from moving forward. The July 28 shooting in a Rainier Beach Safeway parking lot left five wounded. The event itself is a regular community gathering, aimed at preventing gun violence, which made the incident all the more tragic. Still, Marty Jackson with the club told KUOW that fear is not going to deter them and their work will continue.

Washington state has sent its emergency task force to assist Hawaii in the wake of wildfires there. Task Force 1 was first established in the 1990s and has been activated for everything from wildfires in Oregon to 9/11 and the Oklahoma City bombing. The task force's William Palmer told KUOW that the team is like a Swiss army knife for emergencies — it has a lot of tools and functions to offer. In Hawaii, the team will spend at least two weeks in a mobile unit. It's sending canine teams to search for remains, and also groups to break and move concrete and steel from debris.

AS SEEN ON KUOW

Peter Buza, owner of Seattle's Kauai Family Restaurant, photographed on Aug. 10, 2023. The Hawaiian community in Seattle is reeling from news of the wildfires that swept across Maui and other islands this week, killing at least three dozen people and wiping out homes and businesses. (Ann Dornfeld / KUOW)

DID YOU KNOW?

Most folks know about the main islands of Hawaii, such as Oahu (where the main airport is), the Big Island, or Maui, which are popular among tourists. But Hawaii is actually made up of a lot more — 137 islands to be exact. They were formed as the Earth's Pacific Plate moved over a volcanic hotpot. That volcanic activity spouted magma to form the islands. The plate moves at about 32 miles per million years, which is why the islands at the north stretches of Hawaii are older and smaller than the southern islands, like the Big Island, which features Mauna Loa, the world’s largest active volcano.

ALSO ON OUR MINDS

A 'mob of criminals' stole as much as $100,000 worth of goods from an L.A. Nordstrom

The Los Angeles Police Department said a "mob of criminals" ransacked a Nordstrom department store, stealing as much as $100,000 worth of products in broad daylight. The smash and grab robbery is at least the third for Nordstrom in less than two years.

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