I’d expect the photographer and friend to be concerned about their safety. I wouldn’t want to be close by when several tons of Whales wakes up.
They didn’t explain why no photos or video were taken as the whales woke up. I’d expect that they’d all return to their normal horizontal position and move away.
SCUBA divers have to actively manage their buoyancy because buoyancy has negative stability. Suppose for example you’re 50 feet under water, and you’ve inflated your buoyancy compensation vest to the point where you achieve neutral buoyancy, tending neither to ascend nor descend. Now imagine some little bit of turbulence, a fish fart, creates a tiny current that pushes you downward a smidge. The greater pressure on you at your new depth compresses the air in your vest just a bit, reducing your buoyancy, so you start to sink a little faster. You go deeper, your vest gets compressed a bit more, your buoyancy decreases even more, your speed increases. If you don’t do something (add air to your vest, take a deep breath to fill your lungs, or kick with your fins), the process will continue until you are descending at a problematic pace. The same process can take you in the other direction, resulting in an uncontrolled ascent if you don’t let some air out of your vest (or get upside-down and kick with your fins). Without direct action from the diver, things can go from fine to “uh-oh” in well under a minute.
So what’s the deal on these whales? How are they “sleeping” and yet maintaining their depth for up to 25 minutes?