The crew of the New Zealand trimaran harassing Japanese whalers in the Southern Ocean had to be rescued after their boat was rammed and sunk by a Japanese ship, anti-whaling group Sea Shepherd Conservation Society says. - Stuff.co.nz
Click on the photo to go to the story where there are more photos of what was left after the collision. (Note: The story reports that the vessel was sunk.)
Sea Shepherd’s newest vessel was covered previously at gCaptain here: ‘Sea Shepherd Unveils New Weapon to Fight Whale Hunters‘
Many of us had doubts that Sea Shepherd had the competency to operate a vessel of this type. I have to say that I am not surprised at all that the end came so quickly for this vessel, although I thought they would destroy it on their own before the Japanese got the opportunity to do it for them. At least nobody appears to have gotten hurt in this incident.
Sea Shepards are nothing more than pirates. Were I on one of those Japanese ships being attacked I'd blow them out of the water.
ReplyDeleteFrom the video, it's clear that the Sea Shepherd crew deliberately put their boat in harm's way. I'm glad they survived, but any sympathy for their organization over this event is badly misplaced.
ReplyDeleteThe position of the vessels implies that the Andy Gil had right-of-way... that being said, look at the wake of the Gil in the seconds before the collision- no indications of deflection in the wake plume, which is indicative of no changes to course, plus there's an increase in foam spray in the wake- it looks as though the Sea Shepherds accelerated prior to the collision... anyone who calls this a deliberate collision may well be justified in doing so.
ReplyDeleteThe Sea Shepherd vessel was actually stationary up until a few seconds before the harpoon vessel hit them. There are 2 videos of the incident one from the harpoon vessel and one for the second Sea Shepherd vessel about 200 meters away. The Japanese vessel sprayed water at the crew (who were standing in the open) throughout while making a hard turn to starboard in order to run into the Ady Gil (whence the appearance that the Ady Gil is moving). The crew of the Ady Gil appear to be disorientated by the water cannon and react too late in pushing the throttles into reverse. The whaling vessel blatantly rammed them with full knowledge and intent.
ReplyDeleteI don't understand the above comment "Many of us had doubts that Sea Shepherd had the competency to operate a vessel of this type." Wasn't Pete Bethune (who designed & built the boat and has taken it around the world) the captain of this vessel? Why wouldn't he know how to handle his own boat?
ReplyDeleteI guess in most of your opinions it would be acceptable to ram a car off the road if it cut me off?!! Whether the Ady Gil was "harassing" the Shonan Maru 2 previous to this incident is immaterial. The Japanese whalers don't have the right to deliberately ram (and sink) boats just because they feel like it. They are lucky they didn't kill someone!
Thank you Nicholas for pointing out the truth and I agree that everyone should watch the footage shot by the crew of the Ady Gil.