NEWPORT BEACH – Whale watchers in Newport Beach Saturday afternoon got a rare sighting of Eastern Tropical Pacific killer whales.

Alisa Schulman-Janiger, a researcher with the California Killer Whale Project, said the pod of five whales including a male and a calf were first spotted swimming a mile offshore at Point Vicente by a group of volunteers with ACES/LA Gray Whale Census and Behavior Project.

“A sighting of these Eastern Tropical Pacific killer whales in Orange County or further north in Los Angeles is extremely rare,” she said. “In my 35 years of researching them, this is the very first time I’ve seen them.”

The group of whale watchers at Newport Landing was excited to see the pod, especially the calf, said Jessica Roame, marine education specialist at Newport Landing.

“We’ve had a very exciting month here,” she said. “Since Nov. 30, there have been at least four encounters in Southern California with different Orca pods.”

These types of whales, identified by their darker saddle area behind the dorsal fin, are usually seen from San Diego to Hawaii and south to Peru. Their most recent sightings in Orange County were off Newport Beach in January 2015 and off San Onofre in September 2015, Schulman-Janiger said.

Contact the writer: 714-796-7909 or dbharath@scng.com