After all the hoopla, Island Mariner’s fake fiberglass orca floated belly up in a slip at the East End Mooring Basin Thursday night.

The whale, which had been deputized in a creative attempt to scare off California and Steller sea lions lounging on the Port of Astoria’s docks, took on multiple wakes and capsized in the Columbia River.

Pilot John Wifler was extracted from the whale by a Port maintenance crew on their work boat. As the contraption was being towed into the basin by the boat, the whale took on more water, capsized again, and went belly up as the Port crew guided it into a slip and sea lions looked on.

“In the current, one of the pectoral fins dug and it rolled over,” Wifler said, standing on the causeway shortly after the incident.

Wifler earlier admitted Island Mariner, a whale-watching company in Bellingham, Wash., had never tested the orca as a self-propelled boat. And the vessel had an open hatch so he could see.

The whale — dubbed “Fake Willy” by many — had sprung a leak and stalled out at North Tongue Point Thursday afternoon as a large crowd waited at the basin for its arrival. The Port delayed the whale’s appearance until Thursday evening, and the orca finally entered the water around 7 p.m.

“It was dead silence as it went out,” Robert Evert, the Port’s permit and project manager, said of the sea lions as the vessel went out, a track of orca calls playing from a stereo inside it.

The Port has effectively used brightly colored surveying tape and pennants to keep sea lions off two of the docks at the basin. But recently, Port staff have turned to more complex solutions, from electrified mats and beach balls to the fake orca.

The Port in late May had been contacted by Terry Buzzard, owner of Island Mariner, who offered to bring the orca to Astoria free of charge to see if it could scare the sea lions. Buzzard said the whale had been used as a parade float and advertising gimmick that had accidentally scared off sea lions near Bellingham.

The announcement attracted national and international media attention. By Thursday, Port Executive Director Jim Knight stood in a conference room at the Hampton Inn & Suites, surrounded by video cameras from several news stations.

Knight decried the effect sea lions have had on the Port’s docks and the Columbia River salmon fishery, and the growing conflict between sea lions and locals. Knight brought up members of the commercial fishermen’s association Salmon for All, local fishermen, fish processors, Port Commissioner Bill Hunsinger and Buzzard to share their perspectives.

“Enjoy what’s going to happen, because I don’t have a clue what’s going to happen,” Buzzard said.

Wifler said after the excitement had ended Thursday evening that crews from Island Mariner would figure out how to get the orca out of the water today.

The population of sea lions, which were placed under the federal Marine Mammal Protection Act in 1972, has increased exponentially to about 300,000 along the West Coast, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Male sea lions travel north in the spring to feed on smelt and salmon. The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife in mid-March counted more than 2,300 sea lions.

Over the past two months, members of the Sea Lion Defense Brigade have reported finding bullet casings at the basin. Sea lions have been washing up along the Astoria waterfront and North Coast, with some observers saying the animals appeared to have been shot.

NOAA recently confirmed that 10 California sea lions and one harbor seal around Astoria had likely died of gunshot trauma. The Humane Society of the United States offered a $5,000 reward to anyone with information about the shootings.