=====  A message from the 'makahwhaling' discussion list  =====

FROM SEA SHEPHERD CONSERVATION SOCIETY
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                       October 16, 1999

WHALE CONSERVATION SHIP SABOTAGED

Sea Shepherd vessel attacked as Makah resume whale hunt practice

The Sirenian, a patrol vessel of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, was 
vandalized during the night of October 15 at its berth in Lake Union, Seattle, 
Washington.

Security guards saw an individual carrying a bucket walking near the vessel 
around 11:45 p.m. When hailed, he ran to a gray pick-up truck and sped from the 
scene. The engine room of the 95-foot former Canadian Coast Guard cutter was 
found to have been sabotaged, with gauges smashed and wires cut. The full 
extent of the damage is being assessed. Extra security personnel have been 
posted on board.

The sabotage occurred as the Makah tribe of Neah Bay, Washington, is 
beginning practice runs for its next whale hunt, five months after the Makah and 
Sea Shepherd clashed over the tribe's killing of young Gray whale on May 17. 
Sea Shepherd and local whale activists effectively blocked the Makah's first hunt 
attempt last fall.

The Sirenian was last the target of vandals when it came under rock assault in 
Neah Bay on November 1, 1998, when windows on the vessel were smashed 
and several crew-members struck by rocks and chunks of concrete hurled by 
Makah on the shore.

"This is not an uncommon event for us," said Sea Shepherd International 
Director Lisa Distefano. "We consider it the cost of doing business. The police 
have not determined who did it, but there's not much question about the motive. 
When you oppose illegal activities such as the Makah whale hunt, you expect to 
become the target of illegal actions. It's the opposition's way of letting us know 
that we're being too effective."

The U.S. whale hunt is the only one in the world to be undertaken by native 
whalers in a member nation of the IWC without the recognition of "a cultural 
and/or subsistence need for whaling" by the International Whaling Commission, a 
violation of the federal Whaling Convention Act. 

Sea Shepherd is putting out a plea for funds to repair the damage before the 
Makah begin hunting again. Under their agreement with the National Marine 
Fisheries Service, the Makah may strike only non-resident migrating Gray 
whales. Last year, NMFS decreed that any whales seen in the vicinity of Cape 
Flattery after November 1 were to be considered migratory whales.
*****