The Ady Gil, formerly Earthrace, is the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society's newest weapon in its fight against Bluefin poaching
The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society has acquired a lean, mean stealth machine to bedevil Japanese whalers in seas around Antarctica when the controversial annual hunt begins next month.
The 90-kilometer-per-hour Ady Gil, known as the Earthrace in 2008 when it set the speed record for circumnavigating the globe, may help thwart the Japanese harpoons altogether in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary, the group says on its website. The craft will also be used to fight shark finning in Galapagos and bluefin tuna poachings in the Mediterranean.
With a cockpit that looks like the helm of a high-tech stealth bomber, the powerboat can pierce rough seas, submarine down seven meters and, with stealth-type black paint, thwart radar, says the anti-whaling group, which is U.S.-based but headed by Canadian environmentalist Paul Watson.
The 24-meter tri-hull runs on biodiesel fuel and can hit 50 knots (93 km/h). It circumnavigated the globe in 60 days, 23 hours, 49 minutes.
The craft was renamed Ady Gil in honor of its main benefactor, who helped the society acquire it.
The society, notorious for daring efforts to disrupt whaling and other sea hunts, lost a ship, the Farley Mowat, to the Canadian government last year. Seized after a confrontation with a Coast Guard vessel during the annual spring seal hunt, the government put it up for sale earlier this year.
The Ady Gil will be pressed into action early next month, alongside the society's flagship Steve Irwin. The Japanese government has argued for the abolishment of the southern sanctuary and justifies its annual hunt as necessary for scientific research.
