Sydney Morning Herald:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/pirates-attack-japanese-whalers/2007/02/09/1170524264085.html#
'Pirates' attack Japanese whalers
The Sea Shepherd approaching the Japanese whaling ship, the Nisshin Maru, off
the Australian Antarctic Territory early today.
Photo: Courtesy of the Sea Shepherd
Andrew Darby
February 9, 2007 - 8:20AM
The hardline anti-whaling activists of Sea Shepherd have found and attacked
the Japanese whaling fleet off Antarctica early today.
After weeks of searching for the whalers unsuccessfully in the Ross Sea , the
two Sea Shepherd vessels Robert Hunter and Farley Mowat appear to have taken
the fleet by surprise.
Sea Shepherd's president, Paul Watson, told the SMH online that his ships
evaded satellite surveillance in order to pounce on the fleet near the Balleny
Islands , far south-west of Tasmania .
"I ran the ships through the ice fields south of the Balleny Islands and came
up on them from the other side," Captain Watson said.
"We took a pounding in the ice, but the satellite cannot track a ship and
wake through ice nor would they be looking there.
"The Robert Hunter is easily keeping up with the factory ship.
The Nisshin Maru was fleeing the Robert Hunter and came directly towards the
Farley Mowat. At two miles, they turned and fled in the other direction."
In their first attack, Captain Watson said his crew cleared the
whale-flensing deck of the Nisshin Maru, when they threw a non-toxic "butter
acid" on it from an inflatable dinghy.
Activists in inflatables armed with nail guns were also fixing steel plates
over drain outlets in the side of the fleeing factory ship, preventing the
escape of whale blood from the flensing deck.
He said the fleet had scattered and the Robert Hunter was still in contact
with Nisshin Maru, which was steaming away at high speed and attempting to use
its water cannon on the activists. "They are easily avoided," he said.
The attack came almost five weeks after Sea Shepherd began searching for the
fleet in the Ross Sea , and with their vessels beginning to run low on fuel.
The group has begun negotiations to enter Australia or New Zealand ports, a
decision complicated by their status as "pirate"
whalers. The Farley Mowat has been stripped of its Belizean registration, and
Britain is to de-register the Robert Hunter in 10 days' time.
Talks are under way with both the Australian and New Zealand Governments in a
bid to avoid arrest.
Greenpeace's ship Esperanza, which had hoped to be first to reach the
whalers, was about a day's sailing away from the position where Sea Shepherd
found them, and approaching from the west, a Greenpace spokesman said.
The Japanese Government's Institute for Cetacean Research, which owns the
fleet, is harpooning up to 935 minke whales and 10 fin whales under its program
of "scientific research". A spokesman for the ICR was unable to comment
immediately.
---------------------------------
Now that's room service! Choose from over 150,000 hotels
in 45,000 destinations on Yahoo! Travel to find your fit.
