Sea Shepherd Crew Attacked By Mob Of Seal Hunters

6.04.2008
Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Society’s ship, the Far­ley Mowat, was attacked this morn­ing by a mob of 30–40 angry fish­er­men. The attack took place while berthed in the French islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon. The Far­ley Mowat was berthed in St. Pierre to trans­fer video footage of the Cana­di­an seal slaugh­ter onto shore and await the resump­tion of the slaugh­ter, which was tem­porar­i­ly sus­pend­ed after the death of four seal­ers.

Sea Shepherd ropes being cut6.04.2008
Sea Shep­herd Con­ser­va­tion Society’s ship, the Far­ley Mowat, was attacked this morn­ing by a mob of 30–40 angry fish­er­men. The attack took place while berthed in the French islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon. The Far­ley Mowat was berthed in St. Pierre to trans­fer video footage of the Cana­di­an seal slaugh­ter onto shore and await the resump­tion of the slaugh­ter, which was tem­porar­i­ly sus­pend­ed after the death of four seal­ers.

Ten­sions quick­ly esca­lat­ed in St. Pierre as the grow­ing mob hurled rocks, threats, and insults at crew mem­bers of the Far­ley Mowat. Cam­era­man Sime­on Hout­man was assault­ed by an axe-wield­ing fish­er­man after step­ping onshore to film the inci­dent. “The fish­er­man raised the axe above his head with one arm and tried to knock Sime­on back with his oth­er. Sime­on jumped back onto the ship just before the mob threw our gang­plank into the water,” said Peter Ham­marst­edt, First Offi­cer of the Far­ley Mowat.

Relat­ed recent news from IMC newswire: Inter­view With Cap­tain Onboard Sea Shep­herd Ship On Cur­rent Seal Hunt | Cana­di­an Coast Guard Rams Sea Shep­herd Ship (twice) | Sea Shep­herd Moves In On Cana­di­an Seal Slaugh­ter

Cap­tain Alex Cor­nelis­sen request­ed assis­tance from the French police–at least half a dozen of whom were present at the scene–but they did noth­ing to defend the ship or crew against the mob. Instead, the police sug­gest­ed that Sea Shep­herd should leave St. Pierre imme­di­ate­ly. Cap­tain Cor­nelis­sen explained to the police that it would take some time to warm the engines in order to leave port safe­ly and avoid seri­ous engine dam­age. He request­ed pro­tec­tion dur­ing that time, but the police did noth­ing oth­er than stand by and watch as fish­er­men hacked at the moor­ing lines of the Far­ley Mowat with an axe and ripped the gang­plank from the ship, set­ting it dan­ger­ous­ly adrift into the har­bor. After the mob sev­ered head and bow-spring lines from the bol­lards, Sea Shep­herd crew mem­bers scur­ried to pull in lines and pre­vent them from drift­ing back towards the screw or into the bowthruster. “The mob respond­ed with a rain of stones and rocks that were thrown with the intent to injure,” said Ham­marst­edt.

With­out engine pow­er, the Far­ley Mowat drift­ed uncon­trol­lably in seri­ous dan­ger of crash­ing into near­by rocks and/or ships in the har­bor. Cap­tain Cor­nelis­sen had no choice but to start the engines cold–risking irrepara­ble damage–in order to avoid a poten­tial­ly lethal col­li­sion. Although the Far­ley Mowat was able to escape the hos­tile crowd at St. Pierre, the extent of engine dam­age sus­tained remains unde­ter­mined. For­tu­nate­ly, all crew mem­bers were on board dur­ing the attack, and no-one was injured.

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