Sea Shepherd’s New Speed Boat, Brigitte Bardot, Broken by the Southern Ocean

Brigitte Bardot, the ex-Ocean_7_Adventurer

The reality TV stars, the Sea Shepherds, took their newest speed boat, the Brigitte Bardot, out on the Southern Ocean recently, which proved to be more than it could handle. The Brigitte Bardot reportedly cracked its main hull and severely damaged the port pontoon in heavy seas. No crew were reported to be injured and the boat will return to Freemantle Australia for repairs.

The Brigitte Bardot is the ex-Ocean_7_Adventurer, a high-tech 115 ft stabilized monohull twin diesel powered vessel built built to circumnavigate the world in less than 80 days. (It succeeded in rounding the world in 74 days in 1998.) The Sea Shepherd’s acquired the boat after sinking their previous speed boat, the Ady Gil, the ex-Earthrace, a biodiesel powered wave-piecing trimaran, which completed a circumnavigation in just 60 days 23 hours and 49 minutes.

Sea Shepherd anti-whaling boat damaged by wave

Contrary to their claims, the Sea Shepherds do effectively nothing to protect endangered whales by their use of   vigilante  violence. While we do not support the continued Japanese whaling, the minke whales being hunted by the Japanese are not endangered, while the Sea Shepherd violence violates the Law of the Sea and risks the lives of sailors on both sides of the conflict.  While we oppose whaling, violence against seafarers of any nation is not an acceptable nor an effective means of enacting change.

Comments

Sea Shepherd’s New Speed Boat, Brigitte Bardot, Broken by the Southern Ocean — 9 Comments

  1. Hey Christina!

    Watson’s merry band still has one B.B. ship to play with. The Bob Barker is still bouncing around on the Southern Ocean even as the Brigitte Bardot limps home.

  2. Serge Gainesbourg has a definite ring to it.

    The Sea Shepherds sell the names of their ships to the highest bidders, so it looks like Bob Barker and Brigitte outbid Serge.

  3. So, you are obviously unaware that the minke whales hunted by the Japanese are not endangered. You seem impressed by the Sea Shepherd’s reality TV thuggery, but obviously are uninformed about what you are watching. There are believed to be more than 600 thousand or so Antarctic minke whales. The Sea Shepherds are doing little protect these non endangered whales and nothing to protect endangered species.

    I do not support the hunting of minke whales, but I stand by my statement that “the Sea Shepherds do effectively nothing to protect endangered whales by their use of vigilante violence.” Diplomacy is a better tool than violence for protecting whales. The truth is that the Sea Shepherds do very little even to protect the minke whales hunted by the Japanese. They do nothing about the whales, some endangered, hunted by the Norwegians and Icelanders. Their illegal violence has only interfered with diplomacy. It may feed Paul Watson’s ego, but it does nothing to protect whales.

  4. So what you are basically saying, it is better to do nothing than to attempt to protect other living things on this planet. The Whale meat industry in Japan has been in the decline for more than 3 decades, yet they still hunt endangered whales right along with Minke whales. So you opinion is that since there are 5 billion Chinese people on the planet, it should be legal to hunt them?

    The Japanese have the ability to stop hunting whale, but they choose not to. The Sea Shepards have the ability to stand by and do nothing, but they also choose not to.

  5. The Sea Shepards risk human life and do nothing whatsoever to protect endangered whales. And no, the Japanese, with some exception do not hunt endangered whales. And if you equate the Chinese humans with Minke whales, well that is your issue not mine.

    I also think that the Japanese should stop whaling. So should the Norwegian and the Icelanders. So far all that Watson’s reality show buffoonery has done is to ruin any chance that the Japanese will negotiate an end to whaling.