**Contributing factors can include “sickness, navigational error, geographical features, a rapidly falling tide, being chased by a predator, or extreme weather,”...**
Pilot whales are chased by predators?
There is no empirical evidence to support that claim. Science Fiction!
I’ve read that the true North is changing. If this is the case the internal compasses are screwed up in birds and whales so they end up in the wrong spot.