The Earthrace - renamed the Ady Gil after it was bought by the American businessman of that name for the anti-whaling Sea Shepherd Conservation Society - will be sailed by Pete Bethune, the Aucklander who took the futuristic-looking wave-piercing trimaran around the world last year in 61 days to set a new record.
It will accompany the society's main vessel, the Steve Irwin, with a crew of 41, which left Fremantle in Western Australia today and expects to reach the Japanese ships in eight to 10 days.
During their five-month hunt last season, the Japanese fleet caught 679 minke whales and one fin whale - below the planned haul of between 765 and 935 whales, after activists threw rancid butter at the whalers, who allegedly deployed ear-piercing sonic weapons against them.
The whaling ships left Japan on November 19.
New Zealand Foreign Minister Murray McCully, his Australian counterpart Stephen Smith and Maxime Verhagen of the Netherlands government said today they don't want the protests ending in violence.
"We do not condone - indeed we condemn - dangerous or violent activities, by any of the parties involved, be it demonstrators or whalers," they said in a joint statement.
"Our governments expect any unlawful activity to be dealt with in accordance with relevant international and domestic laws."
The three governments said the Southern Ocean was a remote and inhospitable region where the risk of mishaps was high and there was little ability to launch any rescue.
"Our governments jointly call upon all parties to exercise restraint and to ensure that safety at sea is the highest priority."
Sea Shepherd founder Paul Watson - who is sailing the Netherlands-registered Steve Irwin - dismissed the governments' statement and accused them of doing nothing practical to stop Japanese whaling.
"These governments don't seem to understand that we're not going there to protest, we're going there to do the job they should be doing," Mr Watson told AFP newsagency.
Mr Bethune has plastered a half a tonne of Kevlar armour on to the Ady Gil Earthrace to reduce hull damage if the powerboat should hit ice, and painted it with carbon-flecked paint that he said would lower the ability of radar detection.
He has set an array of speakers capable of 9000 watts of sound into the rear of the cockpit, to pound the whalers with music such as Tangaroa by Tiki Taane.
"It's a pretty spooky dark song and it's got this sort of ethereal Maori chant going on it and I don't think they'll like it at all.
"It's a little bit of mind games. We're not down there to make friends with them - we're down there to intimidate them and disrupt them and see what we can do to make life difficult."
NZPA
source: newshub archive
