Posted under Whaling
The Sea Shepherd vessel, the Steve Irwin, has started the voyage back to Hobart, Australia. They have vowed to return next year with a better, faster ship to continue the harrassment.
They had enough fuel to carry on the harrassment of the Japanese whaling fleet but have decided to return slightly earlier to avoid a military style confrontation with the Japanese.
The Steve Irwin is now being hunted by the Taiyo Maru No 38, a swift and manoeuvrable 49m boat that has accompanied the Japanese fleet. Watson believes the boat contains a consignment of security personnel who are ready to board the Steve Irwin and confiscate any video footage that their activists and a separate film crew from the Discovery Channel have been gathering throughout the winter. This action would amount to piracy on the high seas.
“We cannot allow this documentation to be captured by Japan,” said Captain Watson.
Sea Shepherd contacts in Fiji had informed Paul Watson that the Taiyo Maru #38 left there a few weeks ago and had taken on extra security personnel before heading back towards the Antarctic. Before Christmas the ship had been used to transport three Japanese sailors who had been injured in a search for a crewmate who had been tragically swept over board and lost at sea. They tried docking in New Zealand before heading to Fiji.
The hunter has now become the hunted… If they find the Steve Irwin, getting aboard is going to be pretty difficult as I doubt Captain Paul Watson will just “heave to” and let them aboard.
Paul Watson, founder of the U.S.-based Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, said in a statement that the group’s flagship vessel, the Steve Irwin, was operating at a disadvantage against three Japanese harpoon boats that are superior in speed and maneuverability.
‘‘We need to block those deadly harpoons and we need to outrun these hunter-killer ships, and to do that, I need a ship that is as fast as they are and I intend to get one and I intend to return next year,’’ Watson said.
‘‘We will never stop intervening against their illegal whaling operations and we will never stop harassing them, blockading them and costing them money,’’ he added.
‘‘I intend to be their ongoing nightmare every year until they stop their horrific and unlawful slaughter of the great whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary,’’ he said, referring to a sanctuary established by the International Whaling Commission in 1994.
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