1986 Hvalur sinkings

1986 Hvalur sinkings
The two vessels over 20 years after being sunk then raised
Location	Hvalfjörður and Reykjavík, Iceland
Date	8 and 9 of November 1986
Target	Iceland's whaling industry
Injured (non-fatal)	0
Perpetrators	Rod Coronado and David Howitt of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society

The 1986 Hvalur sinkings occurred in Iceland's Reykjavík harbour in November 1986, when anti-whaling activists from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society sank two unoccupied whaling vessels, Hvalur 6 and Hvalur 7, and sabotaged a whale processing station in Hvalfjörður. No one was injured in the incident.

Background

A moratorium on commercial whaling was implemented by the International Whaling Commission in January 1986; the ban allowed for scientific whaling to continue. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society direct-action environmentalist group wished to intervene in the whaling continued by Iceland, Norway, the Soviet Union, Japan, and the Faroe Islands. The Iceland government stated that taking 120 whales in 1986 for research was vital to its fishing industry.^[1] In June 1986, the plan was formulated to sabotage Iceland's whaling industry with an emphasis on causing as much damage as possible. Instructions were to act when there was no threat to human life. One of the perpetrators, Rod Coronado, was also allegedly involved in an attack on Faroese whalers in June.^[2] The operation was delayed due to a summit in Reykjavík between the governments of the United States and the Soviet Union that October.^[3]

Operation

Sea Shepherd's Coronado and David Howitt flew into Reykjavík in either August or early October 1986.^[2][3][4] Howitt has also been named as David Howard, Nick Taylor or Martin Braidley.^[3][5] The pair stayed at a youth hostel and began covertly investigating the local whaling industry. It has been reported that they posed as tourists and took jobs at a fish factory.^[2][6] On 8 November, they traveled 50 miles to the nation's only whale processing station in Hvalfjörður, where they broke in at 8:00 pm. Sledgehammers, wrenches, and other common tools were used to systematically destroy computers, power generators, machinery, and windows. The large refrigeration unit used to freeze the season's catch was destroyed beyond repair. The facility's records were doused with acid. The main factory and two smaller buildings were left inoperable.^[2][3]

Coronado and Howitt then returned during the early hours of the 9 November to Reykjavík. There, three of the country's four whaling vessels were moored. The seacock of the first ship was opened at 5:20 am while the second was opened shortly after. The boats flooded with water and sunk within a half hour. The third whaler, Hvalur 8, was not attacked since a watchman was aboard.^[4] The police did not arrive to the harbor until 7:00 am, and the attackers were able to flee the country via a 7:45 am flight to Luxembourg.^[2] They were subjects of a routine traffic stop en route to the airport but the police did not suspect them of any wrongdoing and let them continue on their way.^[4] In November of the same year the two 430-ton whaling vessels were raised from the harbor floor by a salvaging company.^[7] According to the whaling company, the attack caused $2 million worth of damage.^[7]

Coronado's first-person account of the events was later published in a militant activist magazine.^[8]

Reaction

Hvalur 6, Hvalur 7, Hvalur 8, and Hvalur 9 in 2008.

Shortly after, Watson took full responsibility for the operation, saying that he had planned it, had picked the team, and had seen that they did their job.^[2] Prime Minister Steingrímur Hermannsson announced that Iceland was trying to find the men and criticised the police for their initial delay that allowed them to escape.^[3] Watson traveled to Iceland in 1988 to face prosecution as Sea Shepherd's leader. He was detained for 24 hours and deported without cause.^[6][9] A spokesperson for Iceland's largest whaling company told The New Yorker that Watson is persona non grata in the country.^[10] With their escape, Coronado and Howitt have never been charged with any wrongdoing in Iceland. Both have admitted responsibility. According to Icelandic police authorities, the statute of limitations for the act has passed.^[4]

As a result of this incident, the International Whaling Commission revoked Sea Shepherd's observer status. Most environmentalists, though critical of Iceland's stand, distanced themselves from Sea Shepherd's violent tactics.^[1] The incident has been described as "an act of sabotage that many conservationists believe helped turn Icelandic public opinion against the cause of saving whales".^[10]

The international reactions were negative.^[6] The action was described as an act of vandalism, an act of terrorism or the act of madmen, depending on the media.^[4] At the time of the incident, Iceland,^[11] Greenpeace International,^[12] and some media commentators in Iceland and North America^[13][14] referred to the sabotage as "terrorism" or "terrorist".^[6] Coronado responded to these comparisons by arguing that the sabotage was "the farthest thing from terrorism" and that whaling itself constituted terrorism.^[15] In a Canadian newspaper the incident was also cited as one of the first steps taken by Coronado in becoming "a new breed of terrorist" who went on to wage a wide-ranging battle for animal rights as a member of the Animal Liberation Front.^[16] Coronado has rejected the "terrorist" label as "garbage", because beginning with the Hvalur sinkings, "he says he has always taken care that no one is physically hurt by his acts of sabotage".^[16]

References