Japanese vessel Shonan Maru II manoeuvres in front of Sea Shepherd’s Steve Irwin in the Southern Ocean. Photo Sea Shepherd Australia/Tim Watters

Mention Sea Shepherd (SS) to most people, and it conjures up images of dramatic whaling boat collisions at sea.

Direct action as a means of gaining public attention works – since 1977, this committed group of hardy activists have been frontline defenders of marine life threatened by unsustainable large-scale fishing.

Founder, Captain Paul Watson, has led many high profile campaigns across oceans – many of which were dangerous – in search of whaling and poaching vessels.

But a public and bitter split with the SS board in November 2022 saw the founder booted out of the company he started.

Or as the ABC reported at the time: ‘Depending on the side you’re on, Watson has been forced out by the group he cradled into being, or he’s making a power grab for an organisation that he chose to step away from, and has moved on without him’.

Watson has gone on to start his own organisation: paulwatsonfoundation.org.

Well-known local Sea Shepherd stalwart, Adam Shostack, is clear with whom he supports.

Sea Shepherd vollies Rosy (left) and Adam Shostack (right)with Chief Campaigns Officer, Peter Hammarsted.
Photo Hans Lovejoy

Loose cannon

When asked what he thinks of Paul Waston’s departure, Shostack told The Echo that ‘Paul is a loose cannon’.

And while Watson inspired Adam to get involved with marine conservation, Shostack sees Watson as a traitor to the cause. ‘Paul likes it his way’, he said.

Chief campaigns officer, Peter Hammarsted, joined the organisation ‘as soon as he was old enough to submit an application’.

He is part of the SS leadership team, and his crew were in Byron Bay last Thursday, as part of a northbound voyage up the east coast by Sea Shepherd’s newest vessel, AllanKay. According to www.seashepherdglobal.org, AllanKay was delivered in February last year, replacing one of the organisation’s four vessels, the Bob Barker.

The former Patagonian toothfish longliner was ‘renamed in honour of Australian couple, Allan and Kay, who donated $5 million to Sea Shepherd Australia for the purpose of buying a new ship’.

Hammarsted told The Echo the ship left Hobart around three weeks ago. ‘We have around 120 crew at sea, which varies, and around 70 per cent of those are vollies’.

In an interview with Paul Watson many years ago, Watson told The Echo at the time he was critical of large environmental groups such as the Sierra Club, and claimed they were more focused on fundraising, rather than getting results from direct action.

SS crew aboard Allankay waved to Byron Shire as they sailed north last Thursday. Photo Alice Bacou

Direct action

Watson said their business model was focused on financially supporting its administration, including those who raise funds, while leaving activism in the backseat.

The Echo asked Hammarsted: ‘Given the public fallout with Watson, how is Sea Shepherd positioning itself to be just as relevant as it was under Watson, and will SS continue similar work that was achieved under Watson? Is there a shift in SS operations, and if so, where to?’

Hammarsted replied that SS are still engaged in direct action.

‘Those clashes at sea were absolutely paramount in getting into the public consciousness.

‘You get to a point in time where people know about the issues. People know that overfishing is a problem. People know that climate change is a problem.

‘They know ocean pollution is a problem. And then people need solutions.

‘It’s not enough to raise awareness about an issue.

Effective tactics

‘There needs to be a concrete solution. I believe in choosing the most effective tool or tactic for a particular problem. When it was illegal whaling, we could get into clashes and collisions at sea, because what they were doing was criminal.

‘When we chased the most notorious Patagonian toothfish poacher in the world, a ship that my crew and I chased for 110 days, until it sank off the coast of West Africa, we could pull up their net and cut it open to free the animals. We could take their gear, because they were breaking the law.

‘But when it’s legal fishing vessels, like krill fishing boats, we need to change the law. The law is insufficient. It’s crazy, but it’s true, that it’s perfectly legal for a massive 130m ship to plow through a massive feeding frenzy of whales’.

Hammarsted said SS recently assisted the Gambian government in Africa to arrest eight illegal fishing ships at sea, which could have only occurred because ‘we had the law enforcement support to do it’.

Political will

‘This is a country with the political will for change’, he said.

‘I spent 15 years of my life chasing the factory whaling ships. We know the images, because we saw it on the news.

‘And in 15 years of campaigning down in Antarctica, we saved 6,000 whales, and ultimately raised so much media attention that the Australian government took Japan to the International Court of Justice [which resulted in Japan halting its southern ocean whaling operations].

‘In Liberia, seven years ago, we assisted the Liberian coast guard to arrest one ship that was killing half a million sharks every year.

‘That ship hasn’t fished since. That’s over three million sharks saved to date. We spent 15 years saving 6,000 whales. Yet in one action, working in partnership with government, we’ve been able to save three million and counting.

‘We are in a situation where we need partners and allies. That includes government, and it includes people. There is a bit of misconception that Sea Shepherd, through direct action, shut down whaling in the southern ocean.

‘What we were able to do was put the issue on the political agenda, which resulted in the Australian government taking the Japanese government to court. Whaling there didn’t end because of Sea Shepherd, it was the Australian public. It was businesses and people in Byron Shire, for example, who donated to the cause.

‘We are still doing direct action. Last year, we pulled up 4,000 octopus traps in the Mediterranean. The year before that, we pulled up 8,000 traps.

‘If the most effective thing to do is put our ship between a whaling vessel and a whale, and it is legal for us to do it – we are not a law-breaking organisation – then that’s what we’ll do.

‘When the issue, for example, is illegal fishing in a country, then it makes sense to work with government to stop it’.

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