29/09/2021
Purse Seiners catch whales?? ⛴
Purse seiners are massive fishing vessels, deploying a large wall of net around entire schools of fish, closing off the net on the bottom, and then drawing the net in, compacting the catch. With nets up to 2000 meters long and 200 meters deep, the catch-area is massive and will entrap anything that cannot swim out of the small holes in the net, including endangered turtles, sharks, and yes, whales and dolphins.
Fisheries observers regularly report that purse seine fishing vessels routinely use whales and whale sharks as living fish aggregation devices, deliberately setting their nets around large marine animals with the expectation that they would entrap the tuna that swim with them.
And that was just what was discovered in August when a large European-owned purse seiner was spotted with two panicked humpback whales in its net by Sea Shepherd's crew aboard the Bob Barker. Despite repeated calls to immediately release the whales by the Gabonese fisheries officers stationed aboard the Bob Barker, the ship continued to haul in their nets to get to their catch within, tightening it around the whales that were fighting frantically to escape.
After over an hour of this struggle, the whales finally managed to escape.
"Even though the two endangered humpback whales were ultimately released, every minute of additional stress reduces the likelihood of survival post-release." said Captain Peter Hammarstedt, Sea Shepherd's Director of Campaigns
Following the incident, footage of the ordeal was sent to Gabon's Minister of Fisheries, Honorable Biendi Maganga-Moussavou, who acted swiftly, revoking the fishing license for the European-owned purse seiner and kicking it out of Gabonese waters, sending a powerful signal to all other fishing vessels in Gabon, that the countries conservation laws and measures are to be followed.
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