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Twenty-two years and 15,000km later: fluke discovery sets new record for humpback whale journey
Whale first photographed off the coast of Brazil in 2003 spotted off north-east Australia in September 2025
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A humpback whale has made a 15,000km journey from Brazil to Australia, marking what researchers believe is the longest distance ever documented between sightings of an individual humpback.
The whale was first photographed in 2003 at the Abrolhos Bank, Brazil’s main humpback whale nursery, off the coast of the north-eastern state of Bahia. In September 2025, it was spotted again in Hervey Bay off the Queensland coast, representing a travel distance of about 15,100km.
Stephanie Stack, a PhD candidate at Griffith University and co-author of new research published in Royal Society Open Science, said it was “extraordinary to photograph a whale that’s gone this distance – it has never happened before”.
Researchers uncover longest whale journey ever documented with fluke photos
Researchers have found two humpback whales that travelled between Queensland and Brazil. (Supplied: Pacific Whale Foundation)
Researchers using a citizen science database found two whales that had travelled between Hervey Bay in Queensland to Brazil in South America.
They used photographs of tails, or flukes, to identify the animals.
Researchers say it is the first photographic evidence that whales move between breeding ground populations.
Record distances travelled by whale populations have been discovered in research published today.
Using citizen science platform Happywhale, researchers analysed 20,000 photographs of whales across the Southern Hemisphere, taken from the 1980s to now.
Scientists used photographs of whale tails, or flukes, to identify individual whales and found that two had travelled across the Pacific Ocean to the other side of South America.
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Two humpback whales set records swimming between Australia and Brazil
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NEW YORK — Scientists have spotted two humpback whales that made separate, record-breaking crossings between Australia and Brazil.
The whales were identified by their distinctive tail markings at the two locations about 9,000 miles apart. They traveled in opposite directions and journeyed farther than any humpback known so far.
“It’s a very rare event, but it is a really wonderful demonstration of just how wide-ranging these animals are,” said Phillip Clapham, former head of a NOAA whale research program who was not involved with the new findings.
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