Posted by nicole on 01/29/2006 5:59 pm

We're almost back to Cape Town, almost back to land.  We're maybe 800 miles south of the southern tip of Africa, making roughly 10 knots an hour in remarkably easy seas so far: we've had the good fortune of transiting across a high pressure zone.  We've just left the 50's and have entered in infamous "roaring 40's" latitudes, so we'll see if our fortune holds...we hope to cover the distance in less than a week.

Good fortune blessed us with the sighting of either fin or blue whales the other day.  Phil and I were able to spot them clearly in binoculars heading opposite our bearing; they were clearly VERY large whales with the distinctive small dorsal fin in relation to their body size, and by their color, the texture of the skin on their backs and the nature of their spouts it was clear they were not humpbacks nor sperm whales.  Blue whales are, of course, the largest and one of the most rare creatures on the planet (that latter fact thanks to past whaling efforts) and fin whales are second to them in size and also small in number (thanks again to the whalers).  Seeing them roaming free and easy in the wide sea was indeed a special moment.

On the same day, we were visited by a fully-grown Wanderer albatross, accompanied by an adolescent Wanderer and a bit later, an adult Royal albatross.  When young, these birds have a white and black mottled appearance, but upon adulthood they blossom into a lovely white bird with distinctive black wingtips on top that taper down the trailing edges to the base of their backs.  They are also massive birds, stretching over 10 feet between their wingtips, and they rarely flap their wings - they deftly use the winds to soar and arc their way back and forth across the sea, the image of strength in the service of grace.

We have also welcomed the return of night, which has been shyly but steadily creeping into the middle of the wee hour watches.  You would never know how much you miss darkness until you live without it for a few months, but still, it is a good thing that it is ebbing in gently on us; for honestly it feels strange and disorienting. It's odd that you can't see the sea. It's odd for the bridge to be dark at night.  It's odd to notice the navigation lights, which have been on during the whole voyage...

And in the past day we've crossed the Antarctic convergence zone, where the cold air and waters of the Antarctic ocean meet the warmer seas and winds from the North.  As before, the zone takes the form of a band of fog, days in crossing.  As we exit it, we are gradually beginning to experience yet another new sensation: the return of warmth, and, eventually, a hot sun over Africa.  Unlike it would be at home, we have witnessed hardly any variation in temperature: it's hovered right at zero degrees since we crossed the convergence on the way south.  For the most part, we've just got used to it and sometimes I've found myself working on a leeside deck in an insulated cotton coveralls with just a t-shirt under it, not feeling the absence of the other layers 'til either the wind came 'round or we changed course.  But that's rare, and only while keeping moving: usually COLD has been a constant theme of this trip.

But it has become an accepted theme.  Many of us from Northern countries have talked about, if we had out choice, we'd rather skip the coming warm weather and just move right into our winter back home, so strange does the idea of transiting a few weeks through a hot summer seem at this point.

Over the past few weeks there's been a lot of talk about what it will be like to return to land, part company and head back to our 'normal' lives after a trip like this.  Of course, no one really knows.  Most of think we'll be fine, 'no worries mate', lookin' forward to getting back home, but that is said without having entered a major grocery store in months, or found oneself in a tight crowd of strangers, or hit rush hour traffic, or seen a television.

Post-trip depression is not something to discount lightly: it's quite common after intense experiences, especially involving a group of people who have experienced a lot together in relative isolation.  Part of it certainly has to do with parting company and leaving the ship: though living aboard a ship can sometimes feel cramped and it feels like endless work that you can't wait to leave, in fact Greenpeace ships have always felt like magical entities to me, as the spirit aboard is strong and you can feel yourself becoming a small part of a long, deeply meaningful history woven into the lives and journeys of these vessels.  Though I've had the good fortune to work and stay aboard many of Greenpeace's ships over the years, the Esperanza was the first one I've actually sailed on the open seas.  But she shares what they all have in common, down to their core: the feeling of a well-loved home created by a community of fellow well-intended people from around the world.

I'm not a romanticizer of the animate by habit: to me, the ship is a complex object that simply unaware of and has no regard whatsoever for her human occupants.  This certainly seems true in her movements as she plies the sea, tossing you about as you try to rise from your bunk in the morning, being completely rude to you when all you want is a bit of steadiness - just five minutes or so please - to wake up and find your balance, to not bang around your cabin when you've only got one leg in your coveralls, to just let that teacup stay put while I run over to make sure the toast isn't burning (please don't let the crew on the Arctic Sunrise read this: they'll have no sympathy whatsoever), only to watch it slide towards the rail of the table...to me, she's certainly a creature of the inanimate world, wanting to do only what all machines want to do: to yield to the power of entropy and slowly, peacefully fall apart into the arms of the elements and be ground back to the dust it was before some folks rudely heated and pressed, formed and weaved all these strange materials together into the form of a ship.

She wants to go where the water and winds want to push her, not necessarily where you want to point her.  Her myriad engines, motors and machines want to fly into a zillion parts and call their job finished.  Her steel doesn't want to fight the salts and she probably finds it cute and humorous that you do.

But because of her crew she's a living entity. She's safety, she sustains and supports.  She's home, even if it's only your home for the length of your stay aboard, she's OUR home, a collective home.  This is what you feel aboard these ships, and you become deeply attached and loyal to them. You fall in love with them, you become dedicated to them, and because you know full well that you are here and on this ship because people from all over the world have given Greenpeace the resources needed to create and operate these vessels, you will do whatever you can to keep her at her best all the time.  Even if the job of the day is gonna really suck, you'll do it because the ship needs it, and therefore we need it.

That's not an easy thing to leave, but for the knowledge that your departure means a new crew will take over and carry out the next part of the journey with the same dedication.

Your crew becomes like your family, as the faces that were so new and strange to you three months ago are now deeply familiar, as you've seen them at their best and sometimes worst, seen them unable to hide their grief and shock and pain after witnessing their first harpooning of a whale, unable to hide their giddy joy at seeing their first iceberg or penguin, unable to hide from you their moments of homesickness, of loneliness, of great irritation about themselves or another member of the crew, unable to hide from you their breaking points, their point of exhaustion, and, eventually, unable to hide the great love and respect they've come to have for you, despite how cool and collected they want to be.  You don't travel over 10,000 miles over more than 70 days on a ship at sea and remain just a colleague to your crew.  Certainly it will not be a casual affair to wave a faretheewell and walk off the dock towards home.

But perhaps the most difficult thing to wrestle with may be for a continuing sense of purpose.  As horrible as it was sometimes to experience, I admit there were moments of great satisfaction and accomplishment that came from frustrating and thwarting a hunting ship from carrying on an easy slaughter upon the whales. I felt very much alive and useful in the world.  As the harpoon shots got closer to us each day and the realization of a true, present danger became deadly serious, the sense of the value of the work became even more clear.  There are so many easy ways to die in this world; being taken down while trying to save a truly innocent, magnificent being from a pointless death seemed a far more preferable way to go than most I can think of, and it still feels that way.   Moments like that, when things are crystallized, your decisions so simplified and consequences so obvious, are rare in life.  I have been forewarned by others more experienced than I to expect a moodiness and muddiness to come with the return of land.  Clearly, it's sagely advice.  That, and avoid television for a while.

But I'm not too worried about it.  I'm deeply thankful to have had such a rare opportunity, such a unique experience, one I dreamed of so many years ago but presumed would never happen, simply because I naively thought that whaling was finished, that humanity had moved beyond it.   Sadly, like so many horrific affairs we humans get involved in, it is not so easy to finish off such clearly unnecessary, cruel and wasteful practices when money and power are behind them.  But back then, I thought the most satisfying thing would be to be in that boat myself.  Now, older and hopefully a bit more wise, it's very clear that the most satisfying thing has little to do with the boat nor the whaling grounds: the most satisfying thing has been witnessing that people still really care deeply about this issue, that all they needed was for it to be brought back to their attention for them to be stirred to passion and effort.  This is what we've seen as a result from this journey: an outpouring of intense, deeply moving messages from around the world and a clear answer to the call to action.  A deep desire to act and a commitment to act.

This morning I was up at 4 a.m. to participate in a very unique event back home in the USA. I had two 40-minute calls in the middle of the night, conference calls back to the states with a whole bunch of 'house parties'.  It was a new idea to me: folks agree to host a party in their homes for friends and neighbors who care about this issue, as a means of talking amongst themselves to agree on some local things they can do on behalf of this campaign.  In each call, there were something like 70 parties on the line (there were 145 parties signed up to participate, from across the country so the calls were divided into a east coast time call and a west coast time call) mostly listening to the campaign present informative material and making a request of what they want the activists to do. I spoke for five minutes or so about what it's been like being down here. (I'm finally being able to figure out how to do that, though it's still strange to try to speak aloud about all of it.)  Then some questions and answers followed.

I expected the questions to be directed to me, asking more questions about what it was like to be down here.  To my surprise and delight, they weren't. Folks had seen the images from here; it was readily clear how unacceptable and brutal the hunt is.  They went straight into depth about the issues, asking for more information about the strategy, about the International Whaling Commission and how Japan can get away with whaling under the guise of 'science'.  Asking about the economics of the issue, the structure of the companies. Asking what they can do and if they can do more...

That, to me, is what this is all about in the end. This is why bearing witness is so effective.  As I've written before, I did not come here expecting that we would literally put an end to whaling physically this season.  There is no way to do that without endangering lives or utilizing tactics many in the world would find ethically unacceptable.  I came here with the hope that we could inspire folks to pay attention to this issue and direct their passion and their outrage towards a real end to whaling.  To take up this campaign with their own hands. When people feel moved to act locally, working together to take the legs out from under the economy that supports the whaling industry, then we'll see the end of this.  And that is exactly what seems to be happening.

And I am looking forward to getting home to take part in that myself.

-Nathan 

Posted by nicole on 01/23/2006 6:14 pm

Well, the time has come to leave the whaling grounds and head homeward. We left the Nisshin Maru and her hunters a few days ago and headed south into the ice towards Antarctica, the white continent, to take in the wonders of the waters and the seascape there. After all the violence and grey steel we've seen, it was nice to have a little time to pay full attention to the marvels of this magical, beautiful, terribly inhospitable place. I have never been at such a loss of words, struck so speechless... words and language seem limited, insufficient for capturing this place, as I suspect the images we took will prove as well, for this is a place that fundamentally defies capture.

The Arctic Sunrise is an icebreaker; the Esperanza is ice class but not an ice breaker, so the Espy stayed just inside the ice field edge, among the flat plates of ice rising and falling softly on the slight swell of the Antarctic ocean, rising and falling as gentle as a person breathes in a peaceful slumber. The presence of the ice breaks any momentum the wind or currents have built on the ocean, so the waters are just this side of stilled and for once it seemed we could begin to exhale. The Sunrise slowly carried on, easing it's way cautiously but steadily deeper in the field, weaving her way in and among the thousands of iceberg islands scattered in all directions, doing the work she was made to do at the hands of a captain born for this work: Arne is considered one of the best ice captains alive.

The Sunrise worked her way through the drift ice until she reached the fast ice of Antarctica, the apron of ice extending and spilling out onto the sea from the land itself, just above the continental shelf. She nosed into the edge of the apron and came to rest aside a vast, flat, frozen plain rising five feet or so above the sea and extending inward to the continent, flowing around and encircling icebergs between the ship and the shore.

The next morning, under a brilliant sun and clear horizons we ferried over from the Espy and joined the Sunrise crew for some fun on the ice and some cautious exploring, as ice is always something to be wary about, regardless of how solid it may appear. The pilot door of the ship opened onto the vast table of solid white, extending, rising ever so gently up and South, all the way up to the exposed faces of the coastal range of the continent, which rose jagged and sharp and untouchable into the deep blue air. And there it was: Antarctica, in person.

Again, words really fail me here. I suspect it may be years 'til I can figure out how to describe it. It's just that magnificent.

From the first step onto the first motionless place we've been for over two months, the day unfolded with one wonder after another. The penguins arrived, little guys, Adeles, who have a childlike movement and curiosity about them: they stagger around like a toddler who's just learned to walk, and they will cross the entire ice field to come right up to you, stopping about two or three feet away, then they'll just stand there and hang out, giving you a thorough eye a for a bit then going about whatever penguin business is, which appears to me to be napping, picking at their down, shaking their heads and funkin' and groovin' to some tune in their heads. A little wing flapping here and there, occasionally a squawk or a rotation or two. Sometimes they'd come in crews of a half dozen or so, sometimes just a sole ambassador. As we wandered around, to stretch our legs and just take it all in, usually we'd have an escort or three. They simply didn't worry about us at all.

The Emperor penguins were more aloof and less curious (or, at least, less willing to show it), choosing to come ashore but just hang on the edge and chill out (or warm up: whatever. like I said, words fail) so we would keep a considerate distance and just sit by them and admire their great size, their powerful feet and beaks, and the beautiful bright yellow plumage on the sides of their necks and the line of their beaks. They, in turn, would mostly ignore us.

For me, however, just finding myself wandering around at the edge of this land was the biggest thrill of all. The land and seascape of this part of the world suggests terms like "moonlike", or "alien" or "otherworldly" but that's exactly the oddity about it: it's none of that - it IS of this world, our world, and very much a real and vital part of it. Assigning it to the conceptual realm of Otherness because it's so unfamiliar to us, so unsupportive of our kind, is to deny it, not respect it, not give it the value we give that which directly nurtures us.

And thus, Antarctica and the sea and the ice that she influences inspire reflection on a greater level of this journey: the value of Antarctica, her waters and the lives of those she nurtures, and the waters that extend from her in all directions upwards. Ultimately, the fate of the true wilderness left: the oceans and the last continent. Our efforts against the whaling fleet mark the beginning of a year long tour to call attention to the health of the world's oceans in totality, and now that I've been here, it makes sense to start here. All of us live north of here, making it seem as if Antarctica is the bottom of the world, yet it strikes me now that perhaps this is where the oceans are born, at least in spirit if not in fact. For here the world is still wild, waters truly clear, the air clean and pure. Words were never designed for this place, and we were not born to live here, yet perhaps we can still learn a vital lesson from here.

The whales are born to come here, and if left in peace, perhaps they can thrive here again. They have existed twice as long as we have on this planet and they didn't manage to make such a mess of the place. And though they are not the only residents here, they are the grandest, as they are among all creatures anywhere, and they serve as symbols of what the oceans mean to us: they reflect the strength, grace, innocence, gentleness and majesty of the seas in an animal form.

The ocean does not serve us, it sustains us. If we, as a species, do not grasp this lesson soon and do what we can to protect the seas from further harm, reverse current harmful practices and begin practices to heal them, we will suffer the lesson upon us in the worst way as fisheries will continue to collapse, species disappear and great systems change irreversibly.

And so the campaign shifts now: the whalers had the arrogance and determination to continue slaughtering whales right before us, amidst us, and hopefully that will be their own undoing. They showed us the true nature of their work, their bullshit "research": the terror inflicted on these creatures as they exhausted themselves trying to flee the hunters, the terror exploded into their bodies as they surfaced, the terror of a long, bloody, miserable death. Among all we tried to do, I believe the most effective act was the most fundamental to Greenpeace, the most basic of non-violent activism: bearing witness.

People are now aware that whaling is still being practiced on a growing, commercial scale and is indeed a potentially rising industry again; from what folks have posted on the internet sites and have sent to us directly, the passion people have for this issue is clear and governments have been sensing it. When the people lead, their leaders will follow. Now it's time for those who profit from whaling and those who prop up the whaling industry by feeding their profits into the huge conglomerates to feel this passion and be forced to follow as well, for unlike politicians, they are not elected, they cannot be thrown out of office by their public. That's the harder task.

The sad thing is that it takes a lot of time and effort to change these things, and meanwhile the whaling still goes on, and we leave knowing the hunt will carry on and now we know exactly what that looks like.

We knew this when we left Cape Town. We knew the limits of our capacities and when we'd have to break off from the fleet, but more importantly we also knew that we wouldn't end whaling outright by coming here, that it would have to be won far from here. For me, that's why I'm feeling alright about leaving, because I think we did all we could do and from what we've seen happening since, it seems like it is having an effect.

So we're heading north and looking forward to coming home. We're expecting to get into Cape Town in a few weeks. We still have the roaring 40's and the howling 50's to cross as we're still deep in the notorious Southern Ocean, down in the 60's, far below the convergence zone. There is a lot more sea to cross and there is a lot to be done on the ship before we go to port, so no one is expecting it to be an easy cruise home. But today the water is flat and it's a full day off, so the ship is pretty quiet as folks start turning their attention to returning home and considering their transitions back into their lives.

I sure am looking forward to getting back home. I miss my friends and family and there's a certain dog back home whose paws I'd like to smell and who's fat ass needs a good run in the woods. The Maryland woods will hopefully have snow in 'em. I'll be driving to Kansas a few weeks after I get back and the Great Plains are so mind-blowingly beautiful in the winter, so quiet, so endless and there's a noticeable lack of big grey ships killing whales there. It's been just long enough now that I'm thinking of things like the smell of fields, the sounds of babbling creeks, the feel of having strangers around, the smells of the city and the country, and the ability to go for whatever kind of food ya want. A pulled pint of good beer sounds divine and sidewalk cafes sound like paradises. And a big bed. And rocks and dirt.

So I dunno know if there'll be another update from me or not, as I hope it'll be fairly routine on the return, but who knows: routine has been a rather rare thing to come by down here.

-Nathan

(photo ©Greenpeace/ADavies)

Posted by nicole on 01/19/2006 9:29 pm

For the past several days, since the African Queen had the harpoon fired over her and the rope came down into the boat, the fleet has broken up and the mothership has picked up and run around erratically, as we've seen before. We have not had to launch the inflatables because the seas have been up and rough, which isn't good for hunting whales nor driving small boats.

So it is as before: right when we needed it we get a break to get some rest and make repairs, and although that means the ship is bobbling around, it's a very welcome development.

Why did they pack up and run? Who knows, but it does fit a kind of pattern we've seen. After the first two days of action, where the Kyo Maru rubbed sides with the Esperanza, we made it hell for them to do transfers and then we showed them the sprayer invention and the fact that they couldn't shake us in the ice because of the jetdrives, they raised tail and ran for a while, perhaps to give things a think and talk to their handlers back home after the story hit large in the press. When they did resume whaling they stayed out of the ice but we stayed out in front of the harpooners. They attempted the transfer of whale meat to the Oriental Bluebird which earned that ship a new paintjob, then the Nisshin Maru intentionally collided with the Arctic Sunrise and the Sea Shepherds appeared. Again the story went wide and again they packed it up and ran, perhaps to have another think? The third (and last) time they restarted their efforts they seemed intent on whaling regardless of our presence, until the harpoon crossed over a boat and again there was intense coverage.

Perhaps now they've decided to wait until we chose to leave, as we've made it known before that we haven't intended to stay with them the whole season, for practical considerations.

If so, I take it as a huge victory in terms of action tactics: they couldn't intimidate us out of the effort down here and, perhaps under a spotlight a bit too intense for them, had to cease whaling? For the first time they can't outrun us, can't outmaneuver us, and, forced to carry on their work in front of us, can't hide the graphic truth of their activities from coming to light.

While there is no way to know for sure about any of this, the fact remains that they have stopped whaling and that was our goal.

61 days we've been at sea, 28 of which we've been with the fleet. I haven't done a count of how many of those days with the fleet were days where we launched the boats, but I expect it may be roughly half, at one point sustained everyday for a week. It has been quite a haul but again I'm just amazed at the tenacity of the crews down here and their focus and determination, and their ability to remain inventive and actually improve our equipment when making repairs. We've broken every boat we've launched at some point, but all save one will still be running when we return to port (hell, I won't be surprised if they find a way to get that one back on line too) and there have been no major injuries.

I'm not sure exactly what will happen next, but will write more later then things become clear. It appears we will return to Cape Town eventually after all, because of the demands on these ships for their next endeavors. At this time, however, I'm not sure of the expected schedule and above all on this trip, I've learned that you can only take it day to day because the unexpected seems to happen here as the rule.

-Nathan 

(photo ©Greenpeace/Sutton-Hibbert)

Posted by nicole on 01/16/2006 09:55 am

Today I woke as usual: clueless to the state of the water and sky. Our porthole lids are down so we can sleep because of the unending light.  A great surprise was waiting for me on the deck: the sun.  We have seen the sun late in our evening a few times, poking below the cloud line at the horizon, distant and cold, but for the most part we haven't really seen or felt the sun in nearly two months solid.  Long ago we resigned ourselves to the overcast, rarely even seeing distinct cloud forms. Today the sun was up and out in full, framed by bands of thin, long, vertebral-shaped cloud spines floating slowly in a gentle wind above a sea made deep blue from the sky above, the sharp horizon broken and defined only by distant brilliantly lit icebergs scattered in all directions and the silhouette of ships.  And a living sky of pure white Snow Petrels on the wing.

And into this we launch again.  I take the helm at noon, after a morning effort where someone runs in and reports that two whales were spotted breaking off the hunter's course and heading our way. The hunter didn't see them because the sprayer was soaking their spotting nest.  THIS is the news that makes your day.  Eventually they made their kill but it took them over three hours and we know others got away.

When we launch the sea is picking up from the morning breeze which has been slowing building.  It's going to be a rough ride.  Again we head towards the Kyo Maru, again we rinse her flying bridge and crow's nest.  And after some time, it's clear the hunt is on.  We spot two large minkes side by side ahead and move to block, but the sea is heavy and once again we're pushing the edges of the boat's limits.  Stuff is crashing around in the boat, straining at their lashings.  A fire extinguisher nearly goes off.  The safety kit's lid is being battered and breaking loose. You can hear the sound of crunching and stretching all over the boat. The boat wants to leave the water on the tops of the chop.  Water is flying everywhere as we try to keep ahead of the Kyo Maru; these large animals can make great speed and it's clear the Kyo Maru is going for a quick kill.  But Andrew is directing the sprayer well considering the wild seas and the harpooner has to step back out of the mist several times.  Again it feels for a moment like they might lose them among the whitecaps and waterwall we're making, but eventually the all too familiar boom splits the air as the pair rise to our right and the one closest to us takes it inline right in the back. Once again the shot is just along our starboard side, striking the whale as it's alongside our bow, no more than ten feet to our side.  This time there's no commands necessary: I've already got the wheel hard over to port as the cable descends and snaps the water as the whale makes for it's last dive.

We stay out and follow the hunter to the mothership, but it's becoming clear that the sea conditions are making another attempt questionable.  Just as we begin the assessment of conditions we are called to return to the ship; news from the Arctic Sunrise is that a harpooner has shot over one of the inflatables and the boat was caught in the rope from above, and that there is at least one person in the water.

We are plucked from the sea on the crane amid confusion about what's happened. As we lift the boat over the railing, it's clear we've sustained more damage, this time from the sea: the bow protection we rigged before has been punched in from the hard pounding we took at the peak of the hunt and we've taken a lot of water into our forward compartment from a previous crack in the hull that's been aggravated wider. It will be long hours again tonight to make the boat ready by morning, involving welding, draining and the dreaded fabric repair.

News from the Sunrise is that no one has been seriously injured, but it is still unclear where things stand.  Until more is known, we will stand down: since they control when they take the shot, deliberately shooting over a boat is a new, dangerous development and we have to consider what it means, to what extent they're willing to risk killing someone to kill their whale.

From what I can see, it looks like the fleet is standing down too.  It appears that all boats are stilled in the waters now but I can't account for all the catchers at the moment.

And all the while the sun stood as witness, staying out with us all day.  Amidst all of this, the crew is in good spirits: the sun has that kind of effect.  It almost feels warm out there, even though we're all still in several layers and it's only the lee side that sees any crew on it.

At this point, there are four fuels that power me: the unrelenting beauty of this whole ecosystem that pleas for peace and solitude, the messages from you folks back home, the determination of this crew to carry on and the knowledge that we in America are directly connected to this, not through me but through Gorton's. 

It can be easy to forget the bigger picture that frames all of this down here: we KNOW that whaling will not come to an end directly from what we're trying to do here alone, while we are here, but it's still easy to get drawn into the blood and the steel here. I know that the Gordon's aspect probably doesn't seem as compelling or dramatic as the scenes of suffering and death, but the name Gorton's keeps rising more and more to the fore of MY mind.

They're an American company connected to this mess and damn it: if an American company is involved then we all are involved.  It simply strikes me as, yes, UNamerican for them to say that you can't do anything about it, or that it's not your problem, or say nothing at all.  We know that in America people are overwhelmingly opposed to killing whales, and yet, despite a direct connection between an iconic American company and these harpoons, the company stays silent. It's outrageous, really. 

I want to bring them back the hearts and intestines and carcasses we're having to weave around in these boats, I want to bring them the harpoons and the hauling lines.  I want to bring their executives here to see it for themselves, to hear the grenade explode and see the burst of flesh in the air. I want to bring them to within a dozen feet of a harpoon striking hard into a whale and I want them to drift in the wake of blood afterward. 

But that is not going to happen, so the link feels more abstract between them and this.  But it's not.  This fleet runs on money: it takes a lot of money to bring these ships here, fuel them, re-supply them. These boats run on money.  The only way to quiet these vessels for good is for that money to stop flowing.  So long as Gorton's is making money for their parent company, these boats will carry on their grim work, and the pure waters of Antarctica and those she nurtures will know what should be theirs by birthright: peace, beauty and solitude.

- Nathan

Posted by nicole on 01/16/2006 09:33 am

Yesterday, the Billy G and the big orange unnamed boat (that's another story there) launched in support of something the Sunrise wanted to try on the mothership during a transfer. I helped 'em launch from the deck then went to work on doing a little camera work on board for the campaign. The boats stayed near the mothership, but there was not a lot of activity. After lunch I suited up to join Zeger in the orange boat so that our bosun, Phil, could take a turn at the Billy G with a hunter. So the orange boat came back, we made the crew change, and drove up to pace just off the side of the mothership. The Sunrise was cycling her boats and crews as well so we hung out for a while, no hunters coming in for a transfer. Eventually a hunter did come in with a whale to transfer, and we decided to monitor the transfer (if practical we check each transfer to see if any fin whales have been taken; they're the second largest whale species and are endangered. The fleet is planning on taking 10 this year, which is a new development).

While we CAN interfere with the transfer, it's a VERY wet proposition, because you have to put your boat just off of the whale tied alongside the hunter's port side, who has five or six water cannons going full blast at you to discourage you. When she pulls up and off to the stern of the mothership after receiving the transfer cable, you have the added four or five cannons on the mothership to deal with, two of which are just unbelievably HUGE in volume and pressure. To block the transfer, you have to make it so they can't release the weight of the whale onto the transfer cable - when they do, the whale moves backward until it's weight is on the cable, so if you're to the side, the whale would come into and potentially under you, which could result in damage to the boat as well as the whale what with all the cable, whale and boat all moving around.

As aggressive as the fleet crews have been at times, they're not going to do this because it would certainly end in tragedy, but, more importantly, may very well end up damaging the meat they've worked so hard to get. It is amazingly difficult to keep your boat into position in all that watery mess, because you literally can't see anything but water (but I wrote about all that before). Point is, if we wish to go thwart a hunt, it's generally better to not start off soaked to the bone in freezing temperature sea water from the cannon. Trust me: this I've already learned from experience.

But Phil hadn't, so just as the hunter was lining up, in comes the Billy G, blazing right on into the cannons. They foiled the transfer for a while to get a taste of what it's like in there. In the middle of it all an opportunity presented itself and off the whale went. Then the hunter peeled off to the starboard; the Sunrise wasn't ready to try their idea, so off we went in pursuit of the hunter, the Kyo Maru, who we now know very well.

Shortly afterward they fired up the water pump on the Billy G and went to work on giving the open bridge a good soaking. The first thing the hunter ships do is start scouting for signs of a pod. They do this from a high 'crows nest' as well as from a wide, open bridge. They all use binoculars. Once they see a pod, then they send up the harpooner. If we can get our obscuring spray high enough it makes it pretty hard for them to see any whales. They spend a lot of time wiping down their binoculars instead. If they can't use their binocs, then they won't see the whales and won't be able to send up the harpooner. We know when we're being successful because you'll see water streaming out of the bridge scuppers, the instruments will be covered with tarps, and you won't see any heads popping up out of the monkey island or the bridge, as they're all taking cover. THAT's when you know they're not going to be able to hunt. And that makes all this work worth it.

Phil was doing a pretty good job on the ol' Kyo Maru: they just kept a straight course amid a steady artificial rain storm and hardly had a chance to see anything. Our job in the orange boat was to help spot him with the water's direction, look for ice or other hazards in the water before him, and generally be his eyes for everything beyond what he was immediately dealing with.

Hours passed. The hunter led us into a scrappy ice field composed of slushy, repeatedly-reformed chunks of ice, so we had to fall in behind for a while. Shortly thereafter we began to experience problems with the 'bucket' on our jet drive in the orange boat. The lever was becoming more stiff and the bucket less responsive. Eventually, we lost control of the bucket altogether, and thus had no forward thrust.

The way a jet drive works, in the most simple terms, is this: the engine turns an impeller that draws seawater into a device that pressurizes it and sends it shooting out the back of your boat. You can determine how much thrust you want by how much throttle you give the engine, thus pressure. A big metal object, called the 'bucket', hangs above the stream of water coming out the rear of your boat. If you lower this bucket, the thrust will be slowly directed downwards and eventually forwards if you put it all the way down, because it's roughly shaped like a scoop. With this, you can bring the boat to a standstill, called "stasis" (bucket directing thrust straight downward) or go backwards by bringing the bucket fully down. The steering controls tilt the bucket to direct the stream to one side or the other. In our situation, something failed in the bucket controls, leaving it hanging fully downward. Thus, we could only go in reverse. We could still steer, but not go forward.

Generally, it's a bad idea to drive a boat in reverse out on the ocean.

Zeger and I decided to see if we could fashion a rope to hold the bucket up to allow us to go forward. If so, we'd resume the chase if we could because, if you've got reliable thrust and steerage then hey; you can keep on going. We had two other folks in the boat, Jeremy, a photographer, and Yuko, a campaigner, so Zegar hopped into the sea at the stern of the boat while I got the rope. There is a platform as the sternmost part of the orange boat (as in the Billy G) which covers the bucket mechanism, so I stayed up on the platform to work from above. In our survival suits, with all the layers we wear inside them, their ability to trap air and thus allow you to float, and their watertightness, it's quite safe to hop in the water. When I looked at him, I noticed just how stunningly clear the water was; I could see his boots so clearly down below the surface it gave an indication of just how pure these waters are. Since it was awkward to deal with the rope from the platform, I decided to just hop in as well. I wouldn't have wanted to stay in for too long, but it was pretty sweet to get into this ocean we've spent so much time on top of and getting tossed around on.

Eventually we couldn't get a rope to stay on the bucket due to it's shape, so I just lay down on the platform, one hand up on the transom to keep me on while I leaned over the edge and held the edge of the bucket with my gloved hand; we could move forward so long as I lifted the bucket all the way up, and with Zeger telling me when to ease it down to halt forward momentum, we were able to bring her back alongside the Esperanza and get lifted back aboard for repairs. We weren't going to be chasing hunter boats with me hanging halfway out the back of the boat with half of me in the water.

I didn't like leaving the Billy G out alone, but the Espy serves well as one great big rescue boat, so we realized our day on the water was probably done. In the end it got a bit hairy, but everyone came home safe.

This is a tough place for humans and human-made things to be asked to work hard. None of these things should even be here at all; none of us should be here. From the sublime grace of her whales and winged creatures, her wild waters and cloak of winter permanence, and her cold, cold sun, Antarctica whispers a mesmerizing yet clear mantra: LEAVE ME AND MY SEAS IN PEACE.

I hope someday soon she gets her wish.

- Nathan 

Posted by nicole on 01/16/2006 09:28 am

When I last wrote, we were a few days into a heavy rotation of driving off the bows of the catchers to thwart the hunt.  Then, right after I sent the last update and went to bed, some rather strange events happened in the "night." (If I didn't mention it before, we've been in 24 hours of light for the past month.  Night is almost a vestigial reference at this point.)

While I was sleeping

First of all, the Oriental Bluebird, the bunkering (refueling) ship for the whaling fleet, reappeared on the horizon.  We were quite south of the border of the Antarctic treaty waters (which prohibits bunkering at sea below 60 degrees south,) so at first we were a little surprised to see them again. The Bluebird and the Nisshin Maru (the mothership, or processor boat) then tied up together.  We sent the heli up and found out that the Nisshin Maru was transferring pallets of boxes labeled "whale meat" to the Bluebird.  Further investigation revealed that the bunkering ship is actually a specialized bunker/reefer ship, tied directly to the fleet and is based in Japan even though it's flagged out of Panama.  Conjecture here is that since the fleet doubled it's quota of whales to kill this year, they need the reefer ship to take some of the meat back to Japan because they don't have the space on the single processor ship, despite her great size.

I don't think we've ever seen this type of activity, so we documented it.  It drives home the sham of the “scientific” mission of the fleet and exposes the endeavor as what it is: commercial whaling.


While the transfer was happening, the Arctic Sunrise crew pulled off an impressive impromptu labeling of the Bluebird. They hopped in their boats, loaded up the paint and rollers and wrote "WHALE MEAT FROM SANCTUARY" on the side of the boat in large letters and "WHALE MEAT" on the stern as well.


While finishing this up, the Sea Shepherd ship Farley Mowat appeared on the horizon.  About this time, the Nisshin Maru hurriedly dropped her lines, pulled away from the Bluebird, made a full turn astern of the reefer and set a collision course towards the Arctic Sunrise.  This was quite unexpected. The Sunrise kept her slow speed and course as per the maritime rules of the road, but then went full astern when she realized the Nisshin Maru was bearing down on her, in an attempt to avoid colliding.  But the ships collided, bashing the Sunrise in at the bow pretty hard. Then the Nisshin Maru steamed north at near full speed, with the Esperanza in pursuit while the Sunrise assessed damage and made repairs.  The whole thing appears to us to have been a deliberate act on the part of the Nisshin Maru captain, staged in a way to make it look as if the Sunrise rammed the processor.  Given these guys some credit: they're a clever and treacherous lot.


Then I woke up

We followed the mothership north all the way to 62 degrees south, the upper limit of the 'box' they set to whale in before the hunt began.  Then we traveled west a bit, then eventually turned to southwest and have returned to the waters just off Antarctica, below 65 south, last night.

I have to admit, it was nice to have two days off from boat driving; it was wearing us out pretty thin.  Our "days off" are spent repairing boats, cleaning the ship and working on new things while the ship pitches and rolls and corkscrews around, meaning you get tossed around into the walls and don't get much real sleep.  

Then when we return to the whaling grounds, we're right back in the boats.  This is pretty fatiguing stuff; you just never get a break one way or the other.  That said, the stamina of this crew has really been impressive and the focus remains tight. All are committed to staying as long as we can to carry on the activities of the campaign.  This is certainly the most physically sustained effort I've ever been a part of, and I'm just astounded about how capable this crew is, and it seems to just get better and better as we go.  

We've got our launch and recovery maneuvers down so well it just flows with efficiency, feeling a lot like a pit row operation at times.  Meanwhile, if you're not on deck or otherwise involved in whatever activity of the moment, you're bringing people tea and hot chocolate or doing their laundry or picking up the daily cleaning chores, or helping the engineers.  All the while the boats are out on the water, all this other stuff is always going on.  And you can still find someone in the lounge from time to time, having a beer at the end of the day, swapping stories and jokes, playing the guitars.  While we pursued the mothership on her most recent run, the captain graciously gave us a full day off; I took the time to fashion a mount out of scrap aluminum for the harmonica I brought along so that folks can play the guitar and harmonica at the same time.  For those of you concerned about our mental and emotional states, we are still having fun, still keeping sane, still keeping a good eye on each other and still hungry to do what we can to stymie this fleet.

- Nathan 

Posted by anthony on 01/08/2006 09:36 am

from Nathan in the Southern Oceans

The last two days have been horrific down here; yesterday evening we were trying to hold off the harpooner in very, very rough seas, heading at nearly 20 knots directly into the wind. We were in the upper ranges of the throttle in rugged, wind-driven chop on swells, at the brink of what was really safe and possible in the boat, a bit off their bow to starboard when they fired their shot off along our port beam and sent it through the back of the minke just behind its dorsal fin. We saw a burst of blood and flesh before the whale dove under and we all realized the harpoon went through the animal and didn't lodge.

Whenever they fire we back down immediately to give them room to finish the kill as soon as possible to end the suffering. We (the "African Queen" from the Arctic Sunrise, us in the Billy G and the hunter ship, the Yushin Maru No.2) all cut our speed and looked for the injured whale. We were about 40 meters off the hunter's starboard beam when the whale rose up just off our bow, breathed, bled and went under again. There was so much blood in the water I was presuming it was going to roll up dead right in front of us. But it surfaced again. They sighted it and started to follow as we paced at a safe distance along their beam so they had room to maneuver...

I can't remember the exact sequence of events, but over the course of the next 20 full minutes they searched and lost the whale and searched again, firing another shot and missing. At one point the whale came by the starboard side of the Esperanza and our captain angrily hailed them on channel 16 to tell them to come over and finish their job. Then eventually lined up behind the whale and finally striking a solid shot on their third attempt. The whale was still alive, still struggling as they winched it to their bow. Blood everywhere. Even then they had to fire a high caliber shot with a rifle into its head. More blood. It was twitching a little here and there as they tied off the securing line around it's tail, slid it along side and started off for the processor mothership, leaving a bloody wake.

Glance up at the clock and start timing out 20 minutes. Do nothing for that 20 minutes. Now imagine taking that long to bleed to death or be drowned. It's a long time.

It was the most tortured, prolonged death we had seen yet. I just don't have words to fully describe it. The only thing I can feel good about is that they had to work long and hard yesterday to get the few kills they got.

But today it was even worse. I wasn't out on the water today because I was too beat up from the day before; not emotionally so much as physically (the boat took a beating a several things broke that needed urgent repair, so I was up 'til near midnight repairing and re-securing stuff) so I watched from the bridge once we heard the hunt was in high gear, and the shot seemed close. It all unfolded just in front of both our ships; we could see it clearly. Two inflatables were working in a bit fairer water off the bow of the Yushin Maru No.1, the third hunter and the only one we hadn't focused on yet. During the course of the hunt, the harpooner fired twice but missed. Then a harpoon glanced through the back of a whale, more forward of yesterday but still not lodging. The harpooner would fire three more times over the course of the next more than 20 minutes (again), the whale bleeding all the while, surfacing, diving, slowing...finally the harpooner shoots and puts the harpoon into the flank just before the tail of the whale - a horrible place to spear the whale, as we were about to witness. They winched the whale to the bow which lifted the tail upward. The whale was thrashing all over the place, blood smearing on their bow sides, as the whale was slowly being drowned because it could not arc it's body to breathe. This went on for what I would guess was something like 10 minutes, the violent, miserable struggle. The rifleman took two shots but in the end, it appeared the whale was drowned after being brought along side. I've never seen anything like it, even though the previous day I thought I'd seen the worst. Everyone on our bridge were just disgusted, horrified and stricken, and already in this voyage we've been around a lot of dying whales.

There is no acceptable explanation for why both these whales took so long to die; why a professional crew of whalers, could do this. The whalers boast of their professionalism and efficiency in doing their grim work, and they claim their methods are humane and the whales die quickly. Our footage should prove the lie to that. One can only wonder how often this happens; in our experience, it appears it's not uncommon. Two crews on two whaling ships couldn't put a mercy shot into a slowly moving, bleeding animal for over 20 minutes when it's out in front of their boat. I cannot think of a word for it, at least not any suitable to print.

Posted by anthony on 01/06/2006 2:52 pm

An update from Nathan

I drove the second shift of the day (so far we split the day between two groups of driver and crews); each shift thwarted the hunter for several hours until they finally exhausted the whale to the point that it was almost constantly surfacing for air. The water pump on the Billy G worked for a while this morning then had to be refueled. The harpooner makes his kill while both boats were dodging and weaving about; he shot very near the Mermaid. The whale was a small one, presumably a calf that just couldn't escape. I was on the bridge for a bit and could finally see the Billy G in action from a distance. It's pretty exciting to see, like a gnat on a very irritated beast.

Our experience was pretty similar to the morning crew. When we started out, the water pump belt broke on the engine and we had to shut the boat down so it wouldn't overheat and bring it back up for repairs. Jetske in the Mermaid did a great job off the hunters' bow until we could return and give them a break by giving the hunter a good long soaking - the harpooner got a lot of mist and had to continually wipe off his goggles and gun sight. Then we had problems with the pump (a bolt broke internally due t but the steering is highly erratic. The whale can surface within feet of your boat and the harpoon will swing around to see if he's got a clear shot. To look up and see that grenade-tipped weapon pointed directly at your face by a guy with his hand on the trigger, seeking the shot, well: honestly, it's startling.

While we were out there he took a shot and missed. He fired right between our boats. The boom of the explosion that propels the harpoon from the cannon is deafening and the projectile strikes the water with a violent force. It takes a minute to realize they've missed; even they thought they got the whale initially. At least for a brief moment, the realization that they've missed brings pure elation. Then they reel it back in fast and are ready to try again so you have to jump back on their bow.

Seeing that first shot close up makes you realized that to be hit with that harpoon is a no-f*king-around dangerous thing: I'm confident it would tear right through the console of the boat and anything in it's path. I'm not trying to be too dramatic here, but it's an odd feeling to know that the lives of you and your crew rest in the fingers of this guy up there. He's amazing at what he does, no joke; I respect his skill immensely, but it's a dangerous needle being threaded here...while I've done work for Greenpeace that I knew carried some serious risks in the worst case scenario, this literally feels like putting your life in a clear, tense danger.

For long spells of time the whale(s) would be surfacing right next to us and if we hadn't been at the right spot it would certainly have been a kill; the boat crews did an excellent job of spotting the whales break the surface before the ship could turn to line up the shot for the harpooner. Several times we caused them to lose the whale altogether and have to find another one. I am sure of this, because of the behavior of the ship. Once they actually slowed to a crawl and wandered around in circles for Eventually he took his second shot and made the kill. The whale dove and resurfaced right in front of us, no more than a dozen feet forward of us. Blood everywhere, it's head emerging out of the water for a second before falling back and going under. A fluke breaks the water a moment later and the harpoon cable starts reeling the whale in. It's done. The harpoon had gone all the way through the whale; the whale appeared to be not much more than maybe fifteen feet long or so. Another young one. Science, my ass, taking down the young of the herd like that...

Then they reel the whale all the way up to below their bow and winch it to the surface and you see it: the entirety of the whale, beautiful smooth blue and white skin except where this jagged dynamite knife blew right through it, it's cable unnaturally tugging this creature of the deep towards the sky, rolled over on it's side, eye dead, a picture of exhaustion, beauty and shameful waste of life.

The helicopter reports later that during the chase, they could see tens of whales breaking off from the pod and getting away. THAT was most satisfying to hear because you simply cannot see that from the small boats; they're too low in the water. On a normal day in these grounds, that hunter would have had quite a day I think; over the course of today, while we were out there, they got only a few small whales and had to go through a LOT of trouble to kill them.

So it feels odd: many got away, but we lost the last one we were fighting for, and we really tried the best we could. We KNOW that they're going to get the whale in the end and it's a matter of how many get away that counts, but suddenly it seems a long distance between what your head is telling you and what your heart is telling you. It's a mixture of emotions, hard to find words for. Perhaps I shouldn't try to write this stuff when it's 19 hours into the day of my first up close experience of such a thstand how much we cherish them; our best way of showing it would be to leave them alone and at peace.

I stumbled across this a little while back, from my book of Emily Dickinson poems:

Whole Gulfs - of Red, and Fleets - of Red -
And Crews - of solid Blood
Did place about the West - Tonight
As 'twere specific Ground -

And They - appointed Creatures -
In Authorized Arrays -
Due promptly - as a Drama
That bows - and disappears -

- Emily Dickinson, 1862