Miami Seaquarium’s killer whale Lolita dies of kidney disease aged 57 before she was set for release into the Pacific Ocean

Lolita, once dubbed the “loneliest whale in the world,” has passed away at the age of 57, just months into her retirement and when plans to return her to the wild got under way.

Miami Seaquarium, where Lolita, also known as Tokitae, lived in captivity for more than 50 years, announced her death on Friday.

“Despite receiving the best possible medical care, she passed away Friday afternoon from what is believed to be kidney disease,” the marine aquarium said in a statement.

Toki was an inspiration to all who were fortunate enough to hear her story and especially to the Lummi nation who considered her family.

“Those of us who have had the honor and privilege of spending time with her will forever remember her beautiful spirit,” it added.

Lolita began showing severe signs of discomfort over the past two days and died despite treatment.

In March, it was announced that a binding agreement had been reached between The Dolphin Company, owner of the marine aquarium, and the nonprofit Friends of Lolita to return the whale to its home waters in the Pacific Northwest.

The Seaquarium, nonprofit Friends of Lolita, and Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay announced at a press conference that they would work to bring Lolita to her native waters in about 18 months.

“I think she will be very happy to be back and it will be therapeutic for her, contrary to the misconception that it will be stressful,” Orca Network’s Howard Garrett told KOMO News at the time.

Experts and concerned individuals had long protested Lolita’s captive conditions, including the size of her 25-foot-long and 10-foot-wide tank, the smallest of its kind in the US.

Just 10 years after Lolita arrived at the aquarium, her companion Hugo died of an aneurysm caused by repeated head trauma, earning her the title of the world’s loneliest whale.

The Lummi Nation of Washington, a Native American tribe, traveled to Miami in 2018 to leave behind a nearly 4,000-pound totem pole as part of an effort to return the killer whale to Washington. It’s part of an $8.5 million effort to bring Lolita home, according to

Jewell James, a member of the tribe, accused the Seaquarium of giving up on the animal’s need for money, forcing it to perform in front of an audience several times a day and said keeping her in the 20-foot tank was the same as keeping her keep in a prison cell.

“She’s related to us and we want her back,” he said.

Lolita was the oldest whale in captivity at age 56 and performed until 2022 when she finally retired after falling ill.

On average, orcas in captivity only live to be about 45 years old.

The killer whale was captured off the coast of Washington in 1970 at the age of four and her mother, now nearly a century old, is said to still be swimming in those waters.

Capturing killer whales was legal in the 1970s, but after a series of protests against hunters attempting to capture killer whales from their mothers, Washington banned the practice.