"Scientists aren't sure why the orcas are going after rudders, but the incident near France was farther north than previous encounters, which have occurred near Spain and Portugal. This suggests that more than one pod of orcas have picked up the behavior, Renaud de Stephanis, president and coordinator at CIRCE Conservación Information and Research, a cetacean research group based in Spain, told NPR.

Orcas are social animals and do sometimes pick up behaviors from one another in a way that strongly resembles human fads. In 1987, for example, orcas in the Puget Sound began wearing dead salmon like hats. According to a 2004 paper in Biological Conservation, one female orca started the trend, and it spread like a viral TikTok challenge through two other pods. After about six weeks, the orcas stopped putting salmon on their heads; a few tried to bring the trend back the next summer, but the fad was done."