PETA recently unfurled a giant banner reading – Thomas Cook: SeaWorld Kills – above the travel company’s headquarters in central London. 

The action is part of the group’s ongoing efforts to pressure Thomas Cook to stop promoting and selling tickets to SeaWorld.

PETA director Elisa Allen said: “As SeaWorld faces a plunging stock price and a steady decline in visitor numbers, it’s time for Thomas Cook to follow in the footsteps of numerous other travel providers – including STA Travel and Responsible Travel – and sever ties with this marine abusement park.”

PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment” – notes that at SeaWorld, orcas are imprisoned in concrete tanks that are the equivalent to them of a bathtub, kept in chemically treated waters, and grouped incompatibly, and as a result of the stress this causes, they often break their teeth by gnawing at the gates of their tanks.

Six marine mammals have died at SeaWorld this year.

Nearly 15,000 people have already contacted Thomas Cook to urge the company to drop its promotions of SeaWorld.