I'm going to stick my neck out here and I expect I'll take some heat for it. Just three weeks ago, I was on the very same whale snorkel expedition that these folks were on.
The folks who run this trip are consummate professionals. They've been doing it for 14 years and, to the best of my knowledge, this is first time something like this happened.
I've looked at the video and I can't determine from what I see whether the snorkler was making an attempt to get closer to the whale or whether he was being pushed by the current in a way that he couldn't control.
I can say this, however: our experience was that when a calf surfaced, either with mom, the calif typically was quite curious and would approach the snorklers (not the other way around). When Mom came up she usually did not approach us, although one time in particular she did, looking at each of us, and apparently deciding we were okay, since she then went back down and stayed in that same location (surfacing every 20 minutes or so) for the next several hours.
This was an unfortunate incident, and thankfully, the injuries were not any more severe than they were. However, at this point, I don't think enough is known to say it was an accident caused by a shift in the conditions in which the snorklers found themselves (i.e., a change in the current) or overreaching by a snorkler who couldn't resist the temptation to get too close.
The crew, I should note, drives home the importance of not getting directly over the whales when you are snorkeling with them and also the need to avoid touching them. Peer pressure is helpful in this regard, since you don't want to be the peron that disturbs the whales and causes them to cut off the encounter. In this case, the fact that there was a male escort is an interesting additional fact, since the mother tends to be more skittish and less likely to hang in one spot when a male is following them.
I'm sure we'll learn more.
Watch the video again and pay attention to how the anchor turns beet red right after she says that phrase.
