It looks like the task of stopping the illegal Japanese whaling is now in the hands of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society. Australia has backed down from aggressively opposing Japanese whaling operations opting to support Japanese Australia trade relations over the interests of the vast majority of Australian citizens.

When the Prime Minister of Japan says jump, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is now responding with a "Yes sir, how high should I jump sir, sorry to have offended you sir, please buy our wood chips and uranium and we will be good little Aussies sir. "

Environment Minister Peter Garrett has decided to step back and watch his bed burn.

Not only has the Rudd government failed to make good on their promise to Australian voters to defend the whales, they are now retreating from the controversy entirely.

Meanwhile the former Environment Minister in the Howard government, former Senator Ian Campbell will be going to Santiago Chile to attend the International Whaling Commission as a representative of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.

What is ironic is that the Rudd government is retreating within sight of a victory for the whales over Japan.

The Solomon Islands have already backed away from voting with Japan at the IWC meetings and this week, Dominican Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerritt announced that Dominica will reverse eight years of support for Japan's position.

The up-coming meeting of the IWC in Santiago, Chile promises to be very unusual. Sources in the New Zealand government have indicated that Japan may pull out of the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary because of economic losses, rising fuel prices and concern for escalation of tactics by the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.

They are correct in assuming that Sea Shepherd will escalate tactics. "We intend to hit Japan harder than ever with new tactics, new equipment and with a renewed determination to shut down their illegal whaling activities. We will never retreat and we will not compromise – there can be no acceptance nor compromising with the taking of endangered species inside an established whale sanctuary in violation of a global moratorium on whaling." Said Captain Paul Watson. "We don't compromise with eco-terrorists."

The Greenpeace Foundation has chosen to ignore Sea Shepherd's offer of cooperation once again.

"We have not heard a word from Greenpeace in response to our offer," said Sea Shepherd Executive Director Kim McCoy. "It really is tragic. Together Greenpeace and Sea Shepherd could virtually shut down all illegal whaling activities in the Southern Ocean. By ourselves we will only be able to shut down 50% like we did for the last two years unless we can secure a 2nd ship.

Greenpeace must understand that they cannot stop illegal whaling with banners and cameras. We need an aggressive intervention."

"The best defense of the whales is an aggressive offensive campaign," said Captain Paul Watson. "And we intend to offend the Japanese with all the resources we can bring together."

The Sea Shepherd ship Steve Irwin is being refitted and supplied in preparation for a November departure to intercept the Japanese fleet.

"If by some miracle we can secure the funding for a second ship we will do so, but we will be sending the Steve Irwin and an international crew of volunteers and we will be deploying new strategies backed by new equipment." Said Captain Watson. "This will be our most dramatic, most confrontational, most controversial and most effective campaign yet. We intend to save more whales next time than we did last time and that is a goal we fill confident in achieving"

Operation Migaloo was a resounding success this past year, saving over 450 whales! One of those whales is Migaloo, or the white whale. We just got word that Migaloo, is alive and well- enjoying the waters off NSW. Maybe this year there will be a baby Migaloo?? We can only hope!

With the prospect of a baby Migaloo, and all baby whales that will begin life this year, Sea Shepherd is determined to protect them and their families. No baby whale should begin her life watching her mother die in agony, only to have her new life cut short by the same bloody harpoon.

Sea Shepherd will be back in Antarctica to stop the ruthless killers. Because when Sea Shepherd is there, the whalers run scared!


The following was sent to us from Ripcurl:
-----
WORD ON THE REEF IS THAT THE LEGENDARY WHITE HUMPBACK WHALE, NAMED MIGALOO, HAS JUST IN THESE LAST FEW DAYS BEEN SEEN CRUISING NORTH JUST OFF THE NORTHERN COAST OF NSW , AUSTRALIA FOR THE ANNUAL MATING AND BIRTHING SEASON!!

Every year at this time the southern humpback whales migrate to the warmer waters off QLD to mate and give birth.

It is wonderful news that Migaloo, a unique and majestic whale lives. There was concern that Migaloo may become an easy target for predators and the Japanese, but his life is being celebrated by Australian Whale watchers!

-----

"Crikey, danger, danger, you whalers, the Shepherds are coming"
- What Steve would say if he were with us

February 23rd to February 27th

Report from Captain Paul Watson
Onboard the Steve Irwin

We've been on the tail of the Japanese whaling fleet for 96 hours since finding them
near the Shackleton Glacier on the Queen Mary Coast of Wilkes Land.

As we pursue the Japanese whalers, the Japanese Coast Guard on the Fukuyoshi Maru
No. 68 continues to tail our ship the Steve Irwin.

The weather has broken temporarily and treated us to calm seas and sunny skies but
another storm is sneaking up on our stern with the promise of all hell breaking
loose within the next day.

The Japanese whalers have turned South heading towards Vincennes Bay between the
Budd Coast and Knox Coast of Wilkes Land.

At noon on February 26th they were at 65 Degrees 10 Minutes South and 109 Degrees 25
Minutes East. They are moving into an area where they can kill whales and if they
stop to harpoon whales we will be on them.

We imagine that the whalers on the Yushiin Maru No. 2 have been tearing their ship
apart looking for our tracking devices. They won't find them, and the batteries are
good for over a year. We may even be able to use the devices next year if the
Japanese fleet returns.

A couple of reporters have asked why we would admit to planting tracking devices on
the ships. The answer to that is we want the Japanese whalers to know that we know
where they are. We want them to know we are on their tail constantly. We want them
looking over their shoulders constantly scanning the horizon for the black ship that
will intervene against their poaching activities.

The Steve Irwin is coming and if Steve were with us he would be saying. "Danger,
danger. Crikey you whalers, these Shepherds are dangerous, because like the rest of
Australia they are very filthy with what you're doing."

Since finding the whalers, the Japanese ships fled from the Australian Antarctic
Territorial waters for two days and are now returning again. They have zig-zagged
for over 800 miles to get to a point only 300 miles from where they were when we
found them. Most importantly they have not killed any whales.

We saw a small pod of Humpbacks today as we passed them by.

Someday, because of our efforts today these magnificent creatures will be able to
swim unmolested and at peace in these wondrous waters and the only harpoons to be
found will be found in nautical museums or in the wax museums of horrors.

Whales weep not for the Steve Irwin is coming!


Captain Paul Watson
Master - The Steve Irwin
Master - The Farley Mowat
Founder and President of the
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
www.Seashepherd.org

Report from Captain Paul Watson
Onboard the Steve Irwin

Today we are plowing through the roughest seas we have experienced in the almost
three months we have been down in the Southern Ocean. The weather will be getting
worse as the continent of Antarctica braces itself for the long dark and bitterly
cold winter ahead of it.

As one storm races over us, another is creeping up behind us from the West.

We love this weather! A combination of these windy seas and our pursuit of the
Japanese whaling fleet translates into no whales killed. This is the third day that
the whales have been spared the bloody horror of the Japanese harpoons.

As the bow of the Steve Irwin rises up on a swell and then hammers down into a
trough, the cold water explodes in white anger over the decks and splashes heavily
against the wheelhouse windows. The ship shudders and shakes, rolls and pitches and
pushes onward and forward.

Ahead of us, obscured by the sleet, the snow, and the fog is the Japanese whaling
fleet running to the East. The weather to the North is much worse. A living monster
of a gale is kissing and kicking at our stern. To the South are the Australian
Territorial waters and the Japanese seem reluctant to enter those waters with us on
their tail. The only course they can follow is to the East and we continue eastward
also, haunting them, harassing them, hindering their every attempt to kill whales.

This is our third day of this pursuit and the third day without a whale dying from a
Japanese harpoon. My crew cheer each time we pass a free swimming whale knowing that
another one will be spared from the merciless assaults of the vicious killers that
run like craven cowards before us.

Six miles to our stern, the Japanese Coast Guard follow, waiting for a reason to
pounce on us should we board a whaler, or if we intervene to stop a killing.

I have to admit that I live for this, the thrill of saving lives from ruthless
killers, forcing them to flee, forcing them to silence their deadly harpoons. There
are few thing smore satisfying

Zin Rain and Nicola Henrich from Australia and Amber Paarman from South Africa are
cooking up a storm down in the galley serving black beans and rice with a cinnamon
orange topping for lunch. The three of them have been serving three meals a day
despite the stormy weather.

In the engine room, Chief Engineer Charles Hutchings from Britain with Engineers
Willie Houtman from New Zealand,, Stephen Sikes from the United States, and Jessica
Gartlan from Australia are keeping our two massive engines turning over, keeping up
our speed despite the pounding of the sea.

Two thousand miles from Australia we are alone down here with eight outlaw Japanese
ships. The Japanese whalers have not found our satellite locators and where and how
we planted them will be undetectable although we imagine they are ripping their
ships apart trying to find them. But the signals are coming through loud and clear
and on schedule. We have them and they know we have them and we don't intend to let
them go.

What a race! The dark blue of the water opens up to reveal half sunken bergy bits
the size of houses or cars. If we hit one of those at full speed we could split our
hull open and so the watch keeps their faces glued to the bridge windows, peering
through the mist and spray, the sleet and driving snow, to find the ice before the
ice finds us.

As we race along the Albatross and the petrels fly like protective air squadrons
beside and above us.

Meanwhile we have Australian politicians warning us that what we are doing is
dangerous. Of course it's dangerous. Racing through treacherous, freezing, waters
filled with chunks of ice, threading our way around mountainous tabletop bergs,
pursuing vicious armed killers that out number us and being pursued by armed
Japanese Coast Guard two thousand miles from the coast of Australia. Please Stephen
Smith, you may be the Foreign Minister but tell us something we don't know.

For the truth is Mr. Smith that we would not be down her risking our lives to
protect whales if your government had simply kept its promise to do something to
kick these Japanese whale poachers out of these waters.

Instead of telling me, a deep sea Captain with decades of experience how dangerous
these waters and the situation is, why does your government not send down a ship to
arrest these poachers for flagrant violation of an Australian Federal court order
that specifically prohibits the killing of whales in the territorial waters of the
Australian Antarctic Territory.

I have 17 Australian crew-members who voted for your government because of the
promise to stop the Japanese whalers by Kevin Rudd and Peter Garrett. They would
rather not be taking these risks but your government gives them no alternative but
to risk life and limb to do what your government promised to do in November but you
now refuse to do in February.

We stopped these killers for three weeks in January and we are working to stop them
for the remainder of February and into March.

Within weeks the ice will begin to form down here and the winds will blow stronger
and colder and the seas will rise into a foaming angry caldron of stinging frozen
brine. The whaling fleet will be forced to retreat back to the land of the rising
sun as the sun begins to disappear in the land of the midnight sun.

Between then and now, every hour and every day we prevent the harpoons from firing
will be a victory and every day that the whaling ships are running is another day
that whales will live that would otherwise be twisting in mortal agony at the end of
a steel cable.

Whatever are critics say about us, our methods, the risks we take, the tactics we
use, the bottom line is that we are representing our clients and our clients are the
whales and we will not play politics and we are not ready to play nice as these
gentle intelligent creatures are exterminated in the name of some pseudo-scientific
research scam being used as a cover for commercial whaling.

Today was another great day for the whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.




Captain Paul Watson
Master - The Steve Irwin
Master - The Farley Mowat
Founder and President of the
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
www.Seashepherd.org

Report from Captain Paul Watson
Onboard the Steve Irwin

It's hard to kill whales when you're running with your tail between your legs and
the Japanese whaling fleet is running, north then west, then east, then west, then
east again trying to throw the Sea Shepherd ship Steve Irwin off their rear-ends.

But our electronic teeth are firmly embedded in their rear stern ends and they are
not shaking us loose. When they turn, we turn, and where they flee to, we pursue. If
they stop we will be on their backs like fleas on a dog.

The seas down here are constantly changing from calm to whitecaps, to heavy swells
and the visibility goes from crystal clear to foggy from moment to moment. The sun
shines and then without warning sleet and snow lash out at the ship and an hour
later the sun is shining once again. The sky fades from blue to grey to white then
to blue again.

The sea is full of icebergs and hazardous semi submerged rock hard growlers. The
icebergs are dangerously beautiful unique ice sculptures ranging from alabaster
white to cobalt blue and emerald green.

In the sea are whales and penguins and in the frigid air are majestic albatross and
petrels. We are not alone out here. We've seen Humpbacks and Piked whales, Fin
whales and Blue whales, Sperm whales and Orcas.

And the birds! Every day we see so many species. Some of which are: Wandering
Albatross, Royal Albatross, Black Browed Albatross, White capped Albatross, Yellow
Nosed Albatross, Grey-Headed Albatross, Sooty Albatross, Southern Giant Petrel,
Northern Giant Petrel, Antarctic Fulmar, Cape Petrel, Antarctic Petrel, Snow Petrel,
Kerguelen Petrel, Blue Petrel, Gray Petrel, Wilson's Storm Petrel, Black Bellied
Storm Petrel.

This is a magnificent place marred only by these cruelly destructive whalers and the
greedy rapacious Patagonian and Antarctic Toothfish poachers.

My crew and I are happily chasing these vicious killers and each day we stay on
their sterns is a day they cannot kill a whale.

Behind us is the large and fast Japanese stern trawler Fukuyoshi Maru No. 68 staying
a steady 6.2 miles to our stern reporting our every move to the Japanese fleet. What
this means is that it is difficult for us to close in on the fleet but we are
tracking them and they know if they stop to whale we will catch up with them so they
can only continue to run.

Onboard the Fukuyoshi Maru No. 68 is a detachment of armed Japanese Coast Guard. The
Melbourne Age confirmed through Japanese Coast Guard spokesperson Takashi Matsumori,
in Tokyo that this military unit is in the Southern Ocean to "to protect human lives
and assets".

It is of course interesting that Japan insisted that the Australian Customs ship
Oceanic Viking had to remove its deck guns and they did, yet armed Japanese Coast
Guard officers are in the Australian Antarctic Territorial waters acting like they
own the place.

The evening of February 24th ended with the Steve Irwin plowing into heavy seas,
engine full out in hot pursuit of a fleeing Japanese whaling fleet.

Another day passing without a whale being killed. It was a happy day for the crew
and earlier in the day we passed a large Fin whale that breached alongside the ship,
we knew that the big guy could have been killed today if not for us being here and
that alone makes our voyage down here worth all the sacrifice, the cost and the
effort.

Yesterday on January 23 at 0600 Hours, the Steve Irwin located the Japanese fleet at
63 Degrees 30 Minutes South and 97 Degrees and 7 Minutes East deep inside the
Australian Whale Sanctuary.

At midnight on February 24th, the Japanese fleet was outside the Australian Whale
Sanctuary at 61 Degrees 31 Minutes South and 106 Degrees 30 Minutes East
Since the chase began, the Japanese fleet has fled 340 miles from where they were
first located although the zig-zagging course they have taken over the last two days
covered at least twice that distance. They are burning a great amount of fuel and
achieving nothing and that cuts into their profit margin and that is the only
language they understand.

Tomorrow will be Day Three and the chase will continue.



Captain Paul Watson
Master - The Steve Irwin
Master - The Farley Mowat
Founder and President of the
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
www.Seashepherd.org

Commentary by Captain Paul Watson


The wild, wild, West is so yesterday.

It's the wild, wild, South at the bottom of the Earth that remains the last lawless
frontier on the planet.

The poachers are running the show and the Sheriff is nowhere to be found.

There are two major criminal gangs on the loose down here. The Japanese outlaw
whalers and the Patagonia toothfish bandits. Both gangs are packing guns and looting
resources.

The Sea Shepherd ship Steve Irwin is the vigilante bounty hunter trying to uphold
the law in a place where the law is regarded as a joke.

The Sheriff in the name of the government of Australia rode in on a macho named
vessel called the Oceanic Viking to …….. take pictures!

Looking for some evidence, they said before high tailing it north to the saloons of
Fremantle to jaw on about "how something gotta be done, but we don't know exactly
what we're gonna do mate."

Meanwhile the indigenous inhabitants of these parts are dying in the hundreds as
cruel blunt tipped harpoons savagely violate their flesh, ramming explosive grenades
deep inside their bodies shredding the soft internal organs of defenseless whales,
leaving them thrashing in agonizing misery as the sea steams with their wasted hot
blood.

The horrific screams of the whales echo across these lonely remote waters where none
can hear their pitiful pleas for help.

It is those screams that have brought us down to these waters to do what we can with
the resources available to us to stop the slaughter.

There is an Australian court order prohibiting the killing of the whales but a court
order without enforcement is meaningless. There are international laws prohibiting
the crimes being committed in these waters but these laws are also meaningless
without enforcement.

Toothfish poachers pull endangered fish from the seas with impunity threatening to
shoot anyone who interferes with their thieving and plundering.

Meanwhile in Canberra, politicians mumble on about radical conservationists taking
the law into their own hands. Academic legal blow-hards spout rhetoric condemning
anyone who tries to save a whale as a pirate or an eco-terrorist.

The rudderless government that promised to stop the killing seems more interested in
maintaining it's role as resource vassal to imperial Japanese trade interests.

In Japan, the government screams "eco-terrorism" anytime someone holds up a protest
sign opposing their illegal whaling.

Politicians and academics, milquetoast greenies and bureaucrats condemn any form of
activism that does more than posture and pose.

And the whales keep dying, harpooned, drowned, electrocuted, and mutilated. They die
in unimaginable agony, choking on their own blood and sea-water with gaping wounds
spurting blood by the gallons into the cold sea.

It is this crime, this senseless, sadistic slaughter, this monstrous, miserable
massacre of the whales that has brought my crew and I to these frigid remote waters.
We have sailed as volunteers into harm's way for one reason and that is to stop the
killing.

It is an awesome task with shackles of impossibility that makes our job unbelievably
difficult. We are opposing violent killers and armed criminal poachers on eight
ships crewed by a Unions controlled by the Japanese Yakusa, backed up by powerful
xenophobic Japanese politicians who would rip the sun from the sky in the name of
blind patriotic nationalism.

Thrown into this mess are out of control Namibian, Uruguayan and other assorted
poachers trying to catch the last Patagonian Toothfish and prepared to shoot anyone
who gets in their way.

And the Sheriff has sailed off to parts unknown to develop his pictures of mother
and baby whales slaughtered side by side so that all of Australia can lament the
horror and do……absolutely nothing.

I sometimes wonder why I do this, year after year, tracking down and hunting
poachers, saving whales in the Southern Oceans, seals in the North Atlantic, sharks
in the Galapagos, sea-turtles in the Caribbean?

I have been accused of being obsessed and the truth is that I am indeed obsessed. I
am driven to stop the carnage because I have seen the steady diminishment and
impoverishment of life in the seas ever since I was a boy and I cannot choose the
path of helplessness and inaction.

Years ago, when I attempted to save a large bull Sperm whale from a Soviet whaler,
the whale was struck in the head by an exploding harpoon showering me in the blood
and gore as the whale thrashed in screaming agony on the surface of the Pacific.
Suddenly that whale saw me, and he dove and I saw a trail of bloody bubbles coming
fast and furious towards where I sat in a small inflatable boat.

The whale rose out of the water, lower jaw open and towered above me ready to fall
forward and crush me. He was so close I could have reached out and wrapped my
fingers around one of the six inch long teeth. His breath was hot on my face and it
was then that I looked into a solitary eye and in that eye, an eye the size of my
fist, I saw understanding, I saw compassion and I saw pity.

That whale understood what I was there for. Instead of coming forward to crush me, I
saw his muscles move and with his dying strength I saw him fall back and begin to
slide into the sea. I saw my own reflection in his eye as that infinitely wise orb
disappeared beneath the waves.

And I saw pity. Not for himself or his kind but for us. We were killers without
reason or passion, thinking little of the life we were extinguishing, killers devoid
of empathy, devoid of feelings.

And I thought, why were the Russians killing these whales? Primarily for spermaceti
oil used for lubricating machinery under high temperatures. And one of the uniquely
human inventions that the oil was being used for was the manufacture of
intercontinental nuclear ballistic missiles and that was when a realization hit me
that we were insane.

We were killing great intelligent sentient feeling socially complex creatures to
produce a weapon meant for the mass incineration of human beings and we were being
condemned as violent eco-terrorists for opposing this depraved lunacy.

And the killing continues as whales die to inflate national pride in Japan.

It is only compassion for my own species that prevents me from killing the killers
and added to this is the frustration of being viewed by anthropocentric society as
being violent for trying to end violence, of being viewed as criminal for trying to
end criminality, of being irrational for trying to address the insanity of humanity.

But as to why I am down here presently chasing the Japanese whaling fleet through a
maze of ice bergs at the bottom of the world through the most hostile and remote
waters on Earth - the answer is that I looked into a dying whale's eye and what I
saw there shamed me and filled my heart with compassion to do all that I can to stop
this horror in the wild, wild remote waters of the ironically designated Southern
Whale Sanctuary.

Where she blows is where she dies and the killers justify their criminality in the
name of national pride. The whales are dying for criminal profits and the Sheriff
is missing in action leaving only us "compassionate criminals" in these waters to
protect the gentle giants from the savagery of our own kind.



Captain Paul Watson
Master - The Steve Irwin
Master - The Farley Mowat
Founder and President of the
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
www.Seashepherd.org

Sea Shepherd Hot on the Tail of Japanese Harpooners


The Sea Shepherd ship Steve Irwin in hot on the tail of the Yushiin Maru No. 2 and
is chasing the ship through a snow storm through an obstacle course of icebergs.

"We have them on the run," said Captain Paul Watson. "The Yushiin Maru is only a
mile in front of us and running at full speed. The Fukuyoshi Maru No. 68 which
carries armed Japanese Coast Guard officers is one mile behind the Yushiin Maru and
closing aggresively"

This chase is taking place well inside Australian Antarctic Territorial waters.
The position at 1530 Hours (Melbourne time)(0345 G.M.T.) was 62 Degrees 30 Minutes
South and 096 Degrees 58 Minutes East.

The Steve Irwin is preparing a boarding party to deliver a warrant ordering the
Yushiin Maru No. 2 and the other Japanese whaling vessels operating illegaly in the
Australian Whale Sanctuary to surrender themselves the nearest Australian port.

Inspired by the passing through the Southern Ocean
By Captain Paul Watson


In confidence my ship sailed South,
Oblivious to danger,
I feared not the coming storm,
To such winds I was no stranger.

But amongst my crew were virgin sailors
Some still sea-sick from just the gentle motions,
For them I knew this would be a test,
And fear would dominate their emotions

The mild sea gave way to rising swells,
Whitecaps spit their salty spray
The swells did begin to rise with the tide,
And upon the dark shroud did flay,

The apprentices on the deck looked towards the rising clouds
Young eyes grew wide with growing apprehension.
Lightning crackled in the sky,
There was growing comprehension.

The tempest burst upon us like a bomb,
The wind plucked the lines in a deadly dearth
The winds wailed through the rigging,
And from dark clouds the storm gave birth.

With lightning flash the rains did lash,
And scoured the decks completely clean,
The wind rose to a frightening roar,
And howled forth like a fiend.

Like a Banshee's mournful deadly wail,
The evil winds did taunt
Disturbing every dead sailor's bones
From the depths they rose to haunt.

Within the gale we heard them chuckle
The aquatic ghouls put on a grisly show
They sought for us to join them,
To share in their pitiful soggy woe

"Ignore the fiends," the Captain cried.
"Ignore the sultry Sirens to,
We shan't be joining them tonight,
No, not this gallant crew."

The ship did rock and it did roll,
Like a toy boat at the mercy of the gale,
Helpless we watched and kept the course,
Hoping the engines would not fail,

To drive into a Cyclone's maw,
Is to spit into God's merciless face,
Prayers and pleads are useless words,
When salt is all you taste.

The wind drives salt from your eyes,
It hurls brine into your frozen face,
Your skin it crawls with the crystals sharp,
This hell provides no safe place.

You watch the bow plunge and dive,
The sea assaults the lonely deck,
The hull it groans and the keel does shiver,
Terrified rats get set to jump the wreck,

The pounding increases as the winds rage on,
Glass is shattered, the lifeboats torn away,
The ship rolls and moans like a dying thing,
And the crew curses every minute of the day.

The savage winds rode on our stern,
The monstrous gale kicked us in our ass,
We surfed upon mountainous seas,
Yearning for the storm to pass.

Salted water flogged us like slaves
As we fought to keep the ship on course,
Blind and deaf we bent our backs,
My God what an awesome force!

Soaked and tired and frozen stiff,
Fingers numb and elbows sore,
Striving to stay awake and alert,
Thank God, we're far offshore.

I shutter to think what a reef would do,
Such winds would dash us to a crushing hell,
No rocks out here to strike a lethal blow,
Each roll does strike the bell.

Sailors tossed like rag dolls across the heaving sea,
She taunts and teases and scoffs at our displeasure.
Our moans and pains mean naught to her,
Her destruction knows no measure.

And as if to illustrate her rage,
She pelts us with hardened balls of hail,
Then slathers us with hoary rotten sleet,
As the gale continues to scream and wail.

And through the wind blown rain I see,
Just how majestic her power emerges,
Admiration removes all fear,
And I hear the poetry in her howling dirges.

I smile and lick the salt from my lips,
Content to ride this storm to hell,
And in that moment the wind did sigh,
And a calm spread out upon the swell,

The sun pierced the dark grey clouds,
A golden ray did stab the deck and mast.
A rainbow struggled across the sky,
The storm was over at last.

Within hours calm was restored,
The recent past was like a dream,
The violence fled without regret,
From the drying deck rose steam.

A sailors first storm is a nightmarish thing,
Driving fear into the heart and soul,
Once over it reveals just how sweet life really is,
The enlightenment achieved is worth the fearful toll.




Captain Paul Watson
Master - The Steve Irwin
Master - The Farley Mowat
Founder and President of the
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
www.Seashepherd.org