In 2019 a Beluga whale was sighted by fishermen off the coast of Norway, on the island of Ingøya near the little town of Hammerfest in Norway’s far north.

By Allan Klo – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9339672

The whale bewildered the fishermen by seeking interaction with humans. He was very tame, friendly and much preferred being fed by humans to having to catch fish, a sure sign that the whale had been raised in captivity.
Further meetings with the Beluga were necessary before a harness was spotted on the animal and removed. The harness had a brand, Equipment of Saint Petersburg (in Russian). It had mounts for tools or cameras or who knows what else. It looked a lot like a GoPro harness.

Visitors started to flow to the phenomenal whale in droves and locals started to organize feeding shows. The Beluga returned a phone that had fell in the water. Footage shows Hvaldimir emerging from the sea with a phone in his mouth. He was also a good fetcher of balls.

By Ein Dahmer – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, ommons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=80320413

The Beluga was named Hvladimir; it’s a pun in Norwegian with hval meaning whale and Vladimir in reference to Vladimir Putin. They are strong suspicions that the whale was trained by the Russian Navy who is known to use sea mammals for military or intelligence purposes (as does the USA), notably on the Olenya Bay Naval bases.
In the BBC documentary, Secrets of the Spy Whale, Dr Olga Shpak says that “the Russian marine mammal community immediately identified him as a whale first captured in 2013 in the Sea of Okhotsk. Through the chain of vets and trainers the message came back – that they were missing a Beluga.” “The location of the Beluga whales very close to the submarines and the surface vessels might tell us that they are actually part of a guarding system,” says Thomas Nilsen, of The Barents Observer.
Yet, according to Morten Vikeby, a former Norwegian consul in Murmansk, Hvaldimir was recognized as a therapy animal that had escaped from a program for disabled children at the Arctic Circle Padi Dive Centre and Lodge, near the Russian Norwegian border. The harness was for towing a boat with children inside.

Hvladimir was found dead near the town of Stavanger in 2024. The first reports indicated gun shots. The autopsy revealed a deadly infection but no gunshot wounds. Due to Hvladimir‘s ties to the intelligence community, activists suspect a cover up and are still investigating the event. For more on this and pictures of Hvladimir at One Whale .

By DiFronzo – Hvaldimir skilt, CC BY 2.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=79250032