For reasons too complicated to discuss here, I’ve been invited to limit my support for the Sea Shepherd organization over on The Acer Guy blog. No it’s not a gagging order - nor is it in any way a reflection of Acer’s attitude towards this highly sensitive movement. It’s just something I’ve been asked to do for a while and I’m totally OK with the reasons.
Anyway, for those of you wanting to hear more about the Ady Gil, this is a project I’m particularly proud to be involved in. It came out of nowhere and completely absorbed me and at the same time stimulated me to get off my butt and use social media for a higher purpose, the results of which I’m really looking forward to seeing in the new year.
I’ve been getting regular updates from the captain of Ady Gil, Pete Bethune, and I thought you’d like to read a first hand report of what these guys are up to. There’s a lot of them but they make a fantastic and very courageous story, I’m proud to be a part of.
Here’s the first batch of Pete’s daily updates, up to Christmas Day. Trust me, it’s worth reading:
Talking Japanese
“Why do you hate the Japanese”, the reporter from Japan asks me earnestly. She’s got a slight American accent, like many young Japanese these days. We’ve been in port a few days now, and this is the fourth Juornalist who’s taken the time to visit us.
“Look I don’t hate the Japanese”, I reply. “I just hate the whalers. And the people who eat whale meat. But if Japan continues to hunt whales, then it is possible that eventually, most of the world will hate you.”
She raises her eyebrows as though she doesn’t believe me.
“But if it is OK for you to eat kangaroo in Australia, why is it not OK for Japanese to eat whale meat.”
I’ve heard this argument, or versions of it at least, from a number of Japanese Reporters. And I roll off my usual reply.
“Well I’m not Australian for a start. But even if I was there’s a big difference between whale and kangaroo. Firstly, there are millions of kangaroos in Australia, whereas there are only a few hundred thousand minke whales left. The genetic diversity of kangaroos is assured because of their numbers, whereas the gene pool for whales is very small. So every whale matters.”
“Secondly, the kangaroos are on Australian soil, and it is up to Australians to manage them as best they can. The whales on the other hand are in international waters. Japan has no right to go stealing those whales. ”
“Thirdly, when a kangaroo is killed, it does not have an explosive harpoon through its back and take 45 minutes to die. It is just wrong what your people are doing down there.” I finish and there is a long pause. I can tell she already has her next question. She’s reading them off a list, like all the other Japanese Journalists. They may as well just email me the questions, I think to myself.
“What about our culture”, she finally says slowy, as though she has me cornered. “Japan has a long proud history of whaling, and it is part of who we are.”
I pause for a few seconds. The repetitiveness of these questions makes them boring, but right now it is part of my job.
“Look, it was the Americans who encouraged you into whaling after World War II. So its not like you’ve been whaling the high seas for centuries…and culture doesn’t make it right anyway. The Sudanese still practice circumcision of women, and they argue it is their culture, but it doesn’t make it right. For a long time the Americans had slavery as part of their culture, but it doesn’t make it right. And right here in Tasmania, for a long time, it was acceptable to shoot Aboriginal people on your land. It was part of their culture. But it doesn’t make it right.” I’ve lowered my voice and there’s an aggressive edge to it.
“Ummm. One last question. The whaling industry employs a lot of people. What do you say to those people who would lose their jobs if whaling was to stop.” I’m wanting to say “they can get f**ked.” Instead I roll off my usual, “well world war II employed a lot of people as well.”
She stands and shakes my hand. “Thanks for your time”, she says humbly, and wanders off down the dock. I’m not sure what she’ll report. I doubt the analogies will make it into the paper. It’s probably not what the Japanese want to hear. But the fact that we’re heading down to Antarctica to try and stop them certainly will…
Blog bought to you by Acer
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Captain’s Blog. Japanese Spies
“How much did these dry suits cost”, says Jimmy, as he squeezes into one of our new black Mustang combat suits? He looks well impressed. He wriggles around for a few seconds, and then his head pops out the neck seal. He doesn’t smile much young Jimmy. And with his skinhead, he looks like he’s about to rip someones head off. It’s a great bit of kit really. Underneath we have these garments a bit like sleeping bags with arms and legs. It was a company in UK called Weezle who generously donated them to us. And on top the Mustang dry suit.
We finally get kitted up and wander outside. We’re cleaning the hull, plus there are two new zinc annodes to install on the driveshafts. This also gives us one last chance to try all this great equipment before heading to Antarctica.
I look up on the dock, and there’s the usual array of locals, and a few tourists off the cruise ship docked just in front of us. But there’s one guy who sticks out like a set of dog balls. While there’s a few other people around who look like they’d cook on a wok instead of a frypan, something about this guy just doesn’t look right.
“Hey Locchy”, I say quietly to the young lad who’s been helping us during his School holidays, “I want you to go and get a photo of that guy up there”, and I motion towards the guy who is pretending not to look at us. Jimmy by now has emerged in his gear, and the guy, on seeing him, raises his camera up and takes a bunch of shots of us, and then goes back to looking at the fishing vessel behind us. Lochy, alias 007, climbs up the dock and wanders nonchanantly towards him. Lochy lifts up the i-phone, and the man suddenly jumps into a van and reverses away, bumping over the gutter on the way. 007 grabs his push bike and disappears after him.
It takes us another ten minutes getting the scuba gear ready, and we’re just about to jump in the water, when 007 scampers back on the stern of Ady Gil. He’s panting, and it takes him a few seconds to catch his breath. “I lost him a couple blocks away”, he starts. “But then when I was coming back, I spotted the same guy parked up over there by the toilter block. He’s got a massive set of binoculars, and he’s now got a camera lense about this big”, and he holds his hands about half a metre apart.
I sneak a glance over at the toilet block and sure enough, the van is parked there with just the corner showing. “Hey Larry”, bring us a couple of flares will ya. Lets see what this flushes out.” Jimmy and I take three hand flares each, we get a few feet underwater, and we let them off, one after the other. The flares look really cool underwater. They initially splutter and cough, and then after a few seconds they roar into life, with a bright glow lighting up the particles in the water.
It’s a good 10 minutes later before we surface, and there’s this hazy smoke all around us. It looks suspicious for sure. Larry and 007 are excited. “It took about 5 minutes”, Larry explains, “and then these two men appeared from nowhere, and reeled of photos until they realized I was also shooting them as well. And they then disappeared around the corner.”
It’s unsurprising I guess. Our presence here is hardly a secret, and if I was the Japanese, I’d have us under surveilance as well. At the very least, it means it is costing them more money to run their operation. Although if boy 007 can outsmart them, I’m not sure its money well spent.
Blog sponsored by Acer.
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Captain’s Blog 5. Leaving…at last
It’s a stiff breeze rollicking up the Port Of Hobart as we say our final goodbyes to people on the dock.
“You be careful down there”, says Pam, who’s been a bit like our Mum over the last two weeks here. “And make sure you all come back in one piece.” It’s a sentiment expressed by many. There are certainly risks in the campaign. We are taking a small boat into the most treacherous waters on earth. There’s the roaring forties, furious fifties and screaming sixties to deal with. And that’s before we deal with any ice.
This boat has never been in ice before, but it’s certainly well proven in big seas. What worries me more are the Whalers. Or Scientists should I say. Actually I’ve decided I’ll call them Scientitsts from now on. Which is a total farce of course. The only science going on down there is how many steaks they can eek out of each carcass. But what the “Scientists” will do to us remains an unanswered question. If the initial skirmishes between the Steve Irwin and the Shonun Maru II is anything to go by, the Scientists are ready for a fight this year…and they remain well funded from State support in terms of subsidies, as well as access to restricted military hardware.
At the end of it though the Scientists are just well payed employees doing a job. It does invovle the killing and butchering of whales, but it is still just a job. The team on Ady Gil on the other hand are volunteers giving up a piece of their lives to work on something they believe in. We’re all exteremely lucky to have this opportunity, and we will tolerate a lot of hardship in hopefully putting an end to the professors, Doctors and Lab Technicians, with their harpoons, knives, and butcher hooks.
A few minutes later and we ease away from the dock, and shortly after Hobart is fading in the background. The crew are all busy outside and I’m alone in the helm pondering the voyage. I’m not elated to be leaving. Maybe relieved a little. It’s been a long wait here, and I wish we’d been down a week ago to support the Steve irwin. If anything though I’m nervous. I’m worried we’ll be a failure down there, and we’ll come back with the Japanese Scientists laughing at us. All we can do is our best though. And hopefully it’s good enough to make a difference.
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Captain’s Blog 6. A long night
There’s a slight diesel smell wafting down into the helm. It’s 11:30pm, nearly the end of my shift. The smell has been there for some time actually, and gradually its been getting stronger. It’s nothing I’d kidded myself initially. For the last three years, we’d run Earthrace almost exclusively on biodiesel, and so the smell of diesel in here is relatively new for me. Eventually I convince myself the smell tonight is from more than just when we refuelled a few days back. I wander into the galley and lift the hatch, and to my horror, there’s several centimetres of diesel sloshing round on top of the tank.
I scurry back in to the sleeping quarters, where Jason is lying asleep. His mouth is partly open and there’s a contented look on his face. I rock his shoulder a few times, “Jason, I need you to drive for a bit bro”. His contented grin is replaced with a scowl, and his eyes open with a “where the xxxx am I look”. He finally nods and starts his ritual for getting up, while I hurry back to the galley to start the clean up.
Eventually I trace the problem to the back fuel tank lid, which is an aluminium disk about the size of a frisbie. It isn’t seating right onto the top of the tank, and diesel is sloshing through a narrow gap. Our tanks are so full though, that if I take the lid right off to repair it, I’ll have a mountain of fuel suddenly sloshing around. In the end I tighten things up as best I can, and then sponge up the remaining diesel. It’s not perfect, and the galley will stink of diesel for some time yet, but at least the flow will be stemmed. In a few days when we’ve burned a bit more fuel, I’ll ge the lads to do a proper repair, I say to myself.
I wander back into the helm, where Jason is tweaking the autopilot. “Man I feel crap”, he says slowly.
“Yeah me too”, I reply in disgust. Diesel is all over my arms, and my clothes wreak of the stuff. The fruit and vegetables in the galley will all stink of the fumes now as well. Here’s me heading out for what we hope is a few months, with no shower on board, and on the first night at sea I’m already covered in crap. Not a good start.
Blog bought to you by Acer.
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Captain’s Blog 7. Where are you off to?
“There’s something wrong with the autopiliot”. Jason is trying to whisper, but he’s not so good at it. I drag myself out of bed and look at the clock on the engine controls. 3am. Bugger. Jumping into the drivers seat, the autopiliot has the error “rudder angle not adjusting”, which means the system is trying to turn the rudder, but seeing no change in the rudder angle. I’ve seen this error before, but the trouble is it can be caused by many things. Cancelling the error, I turn the steering wheel manually, and Ady Gil starts a slow turn to port, and back towards Antarctica.
“What’s wrong”, says Jason with concern.
“Well, I reckon the hydraulics are all OK, so its probably a problem with the electronics. We’ll just steer her manually overnight, and hopefully fix things in the morning.”
Steering this big boat manually is a challenge though. The big waves picking us up skew the stern to starboard, and then back to port as we fall aff the back. The trick is to anticipate the waves, and adjust before you’re too far off course. Jason slowly gets the hang of it, now running off the compass for his bearing, and I slumber back to my little scratcher. I scored a bottom bunk tonight which is always nice.
Captains Blog by Acer
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Captains Blog 8. Wet bum.
The water looks cold and uninviting. The waves are a good 3m in height, and we’re stopped somewhere in the roaring forties, with a mission to troubleshoot the steering system. Everything seems OK, with the exception of the starboard outrigger, which we haven’t inspected yet. The trouble is getting there is not so easy, and to then do the inspection, you’re gona end up getting wet, as the constant waves come crashing past us.
I look at Jimmy. Maybe I should send him out. He’s a tough little bugger, and would handle it OK. ALthough I might end up having to go myself anyway, depending on what the problem is. So I decide to go myself. The good thing with doing the crap jobs like this, is the crew respect you for it. I’ll be asking this bunch of lads to do some dangerous jobs over the next few months, and they’ll be more inclined to follow orders if they know I’m willing to do the same job as well.
So I pull off my black ski pants and scarper out on the rope, and abseil down the outrigger. I bury my head in the circular hatch, and am just adjusting to the light when a wave comes shooting right up my bum. Its a cold blast enough to make me wish I had sent Jimmy after all. I can also hear the lads all laughing at me from the back deck. What respect I have from them eh!
The good news is the hydraulic arm has actually come off from the tillar arm. So the ram has been moving OK, but the rudder has been just flapping in the breeze. The rudder on the other outrigger has been doing all the steering. The bolts and washers are all there, and just the nut is missing.
“Grab us an M24 nut will ya”, I yell at Jason. He scarpers off to do some digging in our collection of nuts and bolts. Its half an hour later and the rudder is all back together. Its a quick and dirty though. The nut is not a nylok, not is it stainless. So it’ll corode quickly in the harsh salt environment. But it does keep us on our way to Antarctica, and we’ll do a proper repair at a later date.
Captains Blog by Acer
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Captains Blog 9. The fluffy fifties
“This is not the furious fifties”, I say to Laurens, who’s busy scoffing his breakfast, “its the fluffy fifties. Laurens finishes his mouthful and looks around the horizon. Its a crystal blue sky, and the wind is a gentle 15-20 knots on our stern, giving a nice rolling 3m swell up our bum. And the barometer is firmly planted at 1000 hPa. About as good as you can expect here really.
When we left Hobart our latitude was around 42 degrees, then as we headed south we passed through what are commonly referred to as the roaring forties, and now the furious fifties. By tomorrow, we’ll be into the screaming sixties. That’s not to say they are always roaring, furious and screaming, but they often are. Although not today by the looks of things.
“You wanna be careful what you say”, Laurens finally answers me. “This Ocean can be treacherous.” How the Dutchman learnt a word like “treacherous” is beyond me. Let along the other 5 languages the Dutch all seem to know.
He’s been an interesting crewman young Laurens. I wasn’t so keen on taking him initially. He arrived on the boat a few days before we were to leave, and I hate big voyages with people I haven’t had on the boat before. But he’s turned out to be awesome. The best thing about him is he is always so damned happy. I’ve never seen him without a smile on his face. Not that you want everyone on your boat running around with valium grins. You need a mix of people really. But having someone who’s always happy certainly lifts the team when things are not going well. And for sure we’ll have a few tough days ahead.
By late afternoon the barometer suddenly starts sinking. There was a depression showing on the forecast, although I’d thought we were going to clear most of it. “Down to 980 now” says Laurens, who has suddenly taken an interest in the barometer. I look out the starboard window, and the gentle 3m rolling swell has morphed into angry 4m waves on the beam. Winds increase over the next hour to at least 40 knots, and soon the waves are towering above us.
“Oh check this wave out”, I say to Laurens, who is perched in the Navigators seat beside me. There are white wind trails up the face of it, and on top there’s about 3m of foam thrashing around. Rather than being like a wall, its more like a mountain, with a peak only 30 or so metres long. It passes ahead of us with a whoosh. Five minutes later and one of these monsters lines us up. I turn the boat to port, hoping to take a little of the wave on the stern. There’s a sudden smack as the wave engulfs us. It flicks us round and lifts up the starboard outrigger, then unceremoniously dumps it back down. We slide off the back face, and the wave races away.
“Do you still get scared at sea”, Laurens asks shortly afterwards. The smile has gone.
“Yeah I do. I’m nervous now”, I reply slowly. “No two waves are ever the same. They all differ in some way. We’re only ever one wave away from being flipped upside down. And while I’ve been in seas much bigger than this, the oceans are unforgiving. If you don’t treat them with respect, they will bite you.”
“That was a big wave back there though eh”?
I look over at Laurens, who remains serious.
“Yeah that was a good wave alright. It was a bit like we were irrelevant though. It just came crashing through and we had almost no impact on it at all. It just smashed right past us.’
we sit in silence for a few minutes. “But you wanna know the best thing? We are the only people who will ever get to see that wave.”
Laurens nods his head slowly and his smile returns.
Captains Blog by Acer
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Captains Blog 10. The first skirmish
“It’s right up our arse Pete”, Jason yells. There’s genuine fear in his voice for the first time.” Throttle hard now bro.” His voice trails off, and he watches the giant whaling vessel loom over our stern. Water smashes in on us from the remotely controlled canon mounted on their bow, and for a moment, it drowns out even even the LRADs.
It was some four hours ago, and under the cloak of darkness that Lawrence and I transferred onto the Steve Irwin for a quick meeting with Paul Watson and his officers. The boat was much smaller than I’d imagined. But its like a rabbit warren, with many levels and rooms all tucked away. “I want you to go and harass that vessel following us”, Paul had said to us. “Do whatever you can.” A quick hot chocolate later and we’re back on Ady Gil, lining up a whaling vessel for the first time. The Shonun Maru is actually an ex whaling vessel. These days the harpoon has been replaced by a water canon, and she simply runs security detail for the main whaling fleet…and for the last week, she’s been trailing the Steve Irwin, making it impossible for Sea Shepherd to harass any of the genuine whalers.
It is just getting light as we start sneaking up on the Shonun Maru, her sleek form gradually emerging from the darkness. There’s a certain sinister air about these vessels. In part I guess because of how much I hate their activities. She is sliding past, maybe just four hundred metres away, and the crew are all silent. Suddenly she stops and turns. For a few moments she is almost stationary, looking at us, and evaluating what to do. Then there’s a puff of ugly smoke and she’s chasing us. It reminds me of a hunting dog in fact, aggressive and calculating. For several minutes she circles, then she comes steaming right in on our stern. As we increase speed, the Shonun Maru matches us all the way up to twenty knots, before we finally pull away. The gap increases to over a hundred metres, and she eventually veers away. There’s an indignant air about her as she turns back towards the Steve Irwin, maybe preferring a quarry she can catch.
We start chasing her instead, but the relentless waves come crashing over the top, covering Jimmy and Mike, now cowering on the back deck. Into the waves like this, Ady Gil bombards your senses. The cabin goes dark, as wave after wave come whooshing over you. It takes a while to catch back up with the Shonun Maru. We come in alongside, and I get my first look at her crew. Hardened Security men (Lab Technicians) glare down at us from behind their flak jackets, LRADs and water canons.
Jimmy pulls out the new laser and starts shining this at the crew. In fact Paul had only handed this over to us a few hours earlier, so its a new tactic for the team. The Scientists though seem relatively unfazed by the light as we try to shine it in their eyes. An occasional one looks away, but for the most part they just continue to glare down at us defiantly. By now they are bombarding us with water canons and LRADs, and if I thought wavepiercing shocked your senses, try this.
The battle continues for some three hours, before we finally line up to deploy the prop fouler. It’s a terrifying feeling putting your boat on the line in front of a 60m harpooner. What makes it more difficult is the astonishing speed and manoeverability of our quarry. It means you need to get incredibly close and cross directly in front of them to have any chance of snaring their props. Which is terrifying indeed.
As we line them up, Jason calls distances. “Throttle hard bro”, Jason yells urgently, as we start to cross their bow. I’ve got our FLIR infra red camera looking astern and the giant vessel engulfs the image. The screen then suddenly goes blank as their water canon hits us from above. I can hear yelling from the stern, but over the LRADs and water its impossible to tell what’s happening.
“Its going to be real close”, Jason says for the second time. “Oooohhhhhh.” A slight hint of relief in his voice? “Fuck was that close”.
Mike and Jimmy drag themselves inside. They look wet, cold and exhausted, but there’s also a hint of anger in them. I can tell the prop fouler never worked. And it means we’ve failed. FOR NOW at least.
Captains Blog by Acer
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Captains Blog 11. Icebergs
“Hey there’s an iceberg up ahead.” Mike is on the early morning shift, and his eager voice wakes me from a deep sleep. The crew were all exhausted after the previous 24 hours of no sleep and the skirmish with the whalers, and none of the others can be bothered getting up right now. I clamber out of bed and climb into the Navigators seat beside Mike.
“It’s over there”, he says, pointing at a berg a few miles ahead of us. Its probably a few hundred metres long, and as we get closer, lots of smaller bergs show up in the water. I’ve told the crew 20 times to be super careful when on watch. We hit a single berg, even a small one, and our season is probably over. I can’t help myself saying it again though.
We slide silently past the big iceberg. Birds circle around it, diving and weaving to pluck little scraps of food from the frigid waters. Icebergs like this act as fish aggregation devices. A bit like a reef. Only here the reef gradually decays away. Small fish, bigger fish, birds and the occasional unlucky penguin all share this shrinking ecosystem.
“You know, a lot of people talk about the amazing colours down here”, says Mike thoughtfully. “But I can’t see it.”
I look over at the iceberg, with big waves crashing up on its northen edge. It’s just white, and the water is green. “You know, I reckon the real beauty down here is in the barrenness of it all. We’ve been at sea for nearly a week, and the only thing we’ve seen above the water are a couple of shrinking ice bergs. Romantic, photoshopped pictures of blue skies and icebergs are used to lure tourists down here to make money. In some respects just like the Japanese come here to make money. But the reality is there is bugger all here, above the water at least. It’s nature’s way of telling us we shouldn’t be here. It’s made this the most inhospitable place on earth.”
We sit there in silence for a while. A couple of simple blokes trying to think deeply. Mike’s brow in furrowed. “yeah but under water is a different story though aye.”
Indeed it is almost the complete opposite underwater. These waters are amongst the richest on earth. Over summer, massive amounts of plankton are harvested by the kryll, which in turn baseload a massive ecosystem. The whales come down here and pig out over the summer months, fattening themselves up in a three month feeding frenzy. Kind of like what UK chicks do over summer I guess. The whales just don’t get any presents to open.
“Do you think the Japanese will ever stop whaling down here.”? Mike suddenly changes the subject.
“I hope so. I wouldn’t be down here if I didn’t think we had a chance of stopping them. And I hope after this year they call it quitz. We don’t belong here mate. The Japanese don’t belong here. No-one belongs here. We should just leave this as the one place on Earth that man hasn’t stuffed up.
Mike nods his head in agreement. He’s been to UK a few times.
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Captains Blog 12. A White Xmas
The food haul off the Steve Irwin a few days ago was not massive, but we did score a few veggies. I’ve wrapped them all up in tinfol, and they’re placed precariously around the exhaust maniforld and turbochargers on our two Cummins engines. There’s even a couple vegan roast turkeys in there as well. Not quite sure what’s in them. They look more like cheese than turkey. But we’ll find out in a few hours, when our Xmas banquet unfolds. The Cummins hangi we’re calling it.
I wander back into the galley where Laurens is busy working on his accessories to the roast. “How about mushgroom sauce”, he says hopefully.
“Yeah if we had some mushrooms. They’re long gone.” He goes back to fossicking through the various bins of food.
“Oh I did prepare this he says”, holding up a green bin of water. His smile never dissappears, only now its even bigger than usual.
“You have a bowl of water, Laurens you are amazing”, I reply with a sarcastic edge, but I’m slightly curious exactly what Laurens thinks he has achieved.
“But it’s snow water. I gathered all the snow on the back deck and we can have antarctic tea.”Which I have to admit is kinda cool. It started snowing early this morning and hasn’t let up. So we’re in for a white xmas. And Antarctic tea it would seem. Although give me blue skies, a white beach and rum n coke anyday.
It seems like ages ago since the Steve Irwin headed off for McQuarie Island. In fact it is not even two days. Time goes so quickly down here. Word came through today that they are in fact heading all the way to Hobart now to refuel instead. It is a big lonely place down here by yourslef. Especially in a tiny little boat. There’s also a sense of what are we doing here. We should be at home with our familiies. Instead we’re bobbing around amongst ice bergs and trying to bring an end to illegal whaling.
I snuck a few calls back to family earlier today. Speaking to Sharyn and the girls just made it worse really. It just made me more homesick.
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This isn’t over yet. And I’m proud (and honored) to be part of this story.
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