Page "Free Willy" Paragraph 28

* The aquatic star of this film was an orca named Keiko.

The huge national and international success of this film inspired a letter writing campaign to get Keiko released from his captivity as an attraction in the amusement park Reino Aventura in Mexico City ; this movement was called " Free Keiko ".

Keiko was famously moved to a bigger pool in Oregon by flying in a specially modified United States Air Force C-17 freight aircraft.

In Oregon it was discovered that the combination of the chlorination and the excessively warm temperature of the water was causing skin lesions.

Then Keiko was moved to Iceland to learn to be wild and after that to Norway where there were other orcas.

Keiko eventually died of pneumonia in a Norwegian bay on December 12, 2003.