Angry Australians.

Theres only one man I know of able to unite Australians and Kiwi's in happy hatred. His name is Glenn Inwoods and he is the hype man for the Japanese Whalers. Here is an example of him is full swing.

Now, people here have asked me why people in Australia support Paul Watson? Well a good part of the reason is Glenn Inwoods. Yes he IS hated in NZ too. Elsewhere in the world he is known for his desire to expand whaling by many times to take tens of thousands of Minke yearly.

His quotes today have once again put fire in the bellys of Australians. Looks like we may yet see some naval action after all!

For the moment though, our hopes are with SSCS.
Shut these whale killing criminals down Paul!
And do it quickly!

Encounter II

Sea Shepherd Clashes
With Whaling Fleet in Australian Waters

0730 GMT December 26th, 2008
Australian Antarctic Territorial Waters

The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society ship Steve Irwin closed in on one of the vessels of the Japanese whaling fleet at 0730 Hours GMT (1930 Hours Sydney Time) on December 26th off the coast of the Australian Antarctic Territory north of the Mawson Peninsula.

The Keiko Maru emerged from dense fog in front of the Steve Irwin. The Sea Shepherd crew pursued and delivered 10 bottles of rotten butter and 15 bottles of a methyl cellulose and indelible dye mixture.

“That is one stinky slippery ship,” said Sea Shepherd 2nd Officer Peter Hammarstedt of Sweden.

The Japanese ship was ordered out of the territorial waters of Australia by Australian citizen Jeff Hansen from Perth, Western Australia. The message was delivered in Japanese.

As the Steve Irwin came alongside the starboard side of the Keiko Maru, the whaler steered hard to starboard and struck the Steve Irwin lightly crushing part of the aft port helicopter deck guard rails on the Sea Shepherd ship. There was no serious damage to either ship.

The Sea Shepherd crew’s objective was to intimidate the Japanese fleet and to keep them moving Eastward out of Australian Territorial waters. The Sea Shepherd crew have been pursuing the fleet eastward for a week. There is only 90 miles left before the fleet enters the New Zealand Zone.

“Our objective now is to chase them out of Australia’s Economic Exclusion Zone.” Said Captain Paul Watson. “I have a chart here and it clearly states that these waters are Australian EEZ. There is an Australian Federal Court Order specifically prohibiting these ships from whaling in these waters. We have informed the whalers they are in contempt of this Court ruling.”

There is no doubt that Japanese whaling in Australian waters has been severely disrupted. Since Saturday, the Sea Shepherd crew have chased the Japanese fleet for 400 miles through heavy fog, dense ice and nasty weather. During that time they have not been able to kill any whales.

“We still have them on the run and we intend to keep them on the run for as long as our fuel resources allow.” Said Captain Watson.

For the Japanese version, try here and here.

Run rabbits, RUN!

In excellent news the Sea Shepherds have located the Japanese whalers in French waters and are now giving chase through Australian waters. You can read about it here and here. The nation of Brazil has also declared its waters a whale sanctuary in a stand against Japanese whalers. Japan has also admitted its whaling is cruel, no great shock but nice of them to say so. I did notice they neglected to say they gut shoot the whales to avoid damaging the whales ear wax, the wax so important to Japanese whale 'scientists'. Now all we need is for someone to tell us what use the age of a dead whale is? Japan has also asked the world for advice on its PR image! Heck you can even win prizes! Somehow I don't think my advice of "stop slitting dolphin throats and gut shooting protected whales in a wildlife sanctuary and people will like Japan more!" is going to win me the CD of origami designs though :(

All in all an interesting few days. The Japanese whalers are on the run, and I have had lots of visitors here! thanks for that! I will try to update more often if I can just stop posting on the very addictive animal planet "Whale Wars" forum!

In other news Australia has still not dropped the threat of legal action in international courts against Japans illegal whaling but its now less obvious in the news as you can see in these 1, 2, 3, examples. Although it must be said Garrett has become a total joke as far as people concerned with the environment are concerned.

Of interest to many is a plan to get sister cities with Japanese cities involved in whale and dolphin protection. If you have facebook this thread goes into the basics of it all.

:)
Thanks for checking out my blog!
I will try keep it updated as this latest wacky Japanese Antarctic whaling season unfolds! For those of you who were fans of the Whale Wars program I want to give you a sneak preview snippet of a report from season two that I hope will make many of you breath a sigh of relief!

From: Crew - Steve Irwin
Subject: Update 1: Emily Hunter Antarctic whale saving
Received: Wednesday, December 17, 2008, 2:46 AM

Sea Shepherds ship finally arrived on the 10th in the morning and I settled into my new home for the next several months – a big black menacing looking 180-foot patrolling vessel originally bought from Scotland, the land of my ancestors. With a million put into upgrades including a helicopter hanger, this ship had a air of professional eco-warriors. No longer is Sea Shepherd the rag-tag ship with water leaking through and bolts busting off. Instead, the ship was upgraded and ready for war. The crew too is different, more professional and even militant than amateurs. There is a professional helicopter pilot, doctor, engineers, welders, ex-navy, ex-captains, ex-cops. Without a skilled trade in ones back-pocket, one almost feels useless (for me, my written word is my tool, visit www.THISmagazine.ca in the Blogs section, you can read my ongoing campaign blogs – called the Polarized series). The crew included 45 volunteers from around the world including a crewmember from Japan for the first time. And a fierceness, conviction and focus I have never seen so pronounced in the Sea Shepherd crews before. Oh, and don’t forget, environmentalism has gone reality TV, Animal Planet is shooting their second season of ‘Whale Wars’ with this campaign.

Commercial Whaling Re-started

Already 2 nations, Iceland and Norway have protected whale meat being sold in Japanese supermarkets. The latest shipment is 65 tonnes of endangered fin whale meat caught by Hvalur hf (Iceland), and five tonnes of minke whale meat caught by the Norwegian company Myklebust Trading.

Once again the whale meat has been tested for contaminates on a special scale as opposed to the broad Japanese seafood contaminate standard scale. As usual the results of the tests are kept secret from the public.

Time will tell how quickly other nations will attempt to re-start their own commercial whaling following the lead of these 3 nations. The second age of Cetacean slaughter is upon us, may god have mercy upon the worlds whale stocks, for it is obvious the Japanese will not.