Scientists have discovered recordings of\u00a0humpback whales\u00a0taken nearly 80 years ago. The haunting song was captured on 7 March 1949, making it the earliest known recording of a whale song.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“This recording was captured by WHOI scientists near Bermuda but they didn\u2019t know what they were hearing at the time so they never catalogued it,\u201d says\u00a0Peter Tyak<\/a>, a marine bioacoustician and emeritus research scholar at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), in a video shared on\u00a0Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n A segment of humpback whale audio captured by scientists aboard Atlantis cruise 154 near Bermuda in 1949. Audio credit: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution<\/p>\n Humpback whale<\/a> song has become such a familiar sound for many people around the world that it seems strange that marine scientists might not recognise it. But \u2013 before this recording was discovered \u2013 the earliest known whale song recordings were picked up by the US Navy\u2019s underwater microphones in the 1950s.\u00a0<\/p>\n Marine biologist\u00a0Roger Payne<\/a>\u00a0shared these beautiful sounds with the world in the 1970s through his album\u00a0Songs of the Humpback Whale<\/a>.<\/p>\n All the while, this recording was waiting, overlooked, in storage until WHOI archivists found it while digitising audio from early underwater recorders. \u201cThey immediately knew how significant it was,\u201d says Tyak.\u00a0<\/p>\n The sounds had been captured when researchers were collaborating with the US Office of Naval Research on several acoustic experiments, such as testing sonar systems and measuring the volume of explosives. It was still the early days of recording noises underwater and researchers didn\u2019t yet know much about where different\u00a0sounds of the sea<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 such as whale song \u2013 came from.<\/p>\n “Data from this time period simply don\u2019t exist in most cases,\u201d says\u00a0Laela Sayigh<\/a>, a marine bioacoustician and senior research specialist at WHOI. “The ocean is much louder now, with increases in both number and types of sound sources. This recording can provide insight into how humpback whale sounds\u00a0have changed over time, as well as serving as a baseline for measuring how human activity shapes the ocean soundscape.\u201d<\/p>\n In the nearly 80 years since these humpback whale vocalisations were recorded, lots has changed. The ocean is a much busier and noisier place<\/a>, because of things like ship traffic, construction and oil and gas exploration.\u00a0<\/p>\n Technology has also progressed leaps and bounds. The 1949 audio was probably recorded using an early experimental underwater recorder known as the WHOI ‘suitcase’. It was then etched onto plastic discs using an office dictation machine: a Gray Audograph.<\/p>\n