I worked for an animal rights org, I am a vego and very dedicated to animals getting a better deal.

When I worked for them, We always tried to separate our group from the Greens. We also worked passionately on the Live Export of Aussie Sheep to the Middle East. As soon as PETA got in on it, we separated from them.

With the Live Export issue:

Animal rights along with the Aussie Meat Workers Union was lobbying to have the sheep slaughtered here in Australia, instead of the torturous journey to the Middle East. When PETA came in on it they threatened the wool industry and took the focus of live export and onto mulsing (cutting away skin on the sheep’s backsides to prevent flystrike). True this is animal cruelty, and PETA’s threats have quickly forced the musling technology to much less cruel methods.

I am sure if I were a sheep, I’d prefer my bum cut to a hell boat trip to a bunch of barbaric arabs for their vile cult like fetish of ramadan.

A few Aussie farmers are now exporting slaughtered carcasses to muslims in I think its Indonesia. Why didn’t PETA use its power to help us or maybe as they are so huge, take on the middle east and its revolting animal practices.

My problem is that groups like the Greens, GP and PETA give us all a bad name.

I saw the footage of the boats, it looked clear to me GP were in the wrong.

Some of these groups care more about themselves than they do about the animals.

They are now destroying with their threats and lies any sympathies the public may have had for animals and their homes (the trees).

actully ill just correct myself a bit there, i have no right really to speak for my old works stand on various other orgs, it was more just me urging them to separate

All who have participated in this discussion have had access to the same information, all of it partisan.
Marohasy, Kerr,and Young see incontrovertible evidence of wrong-doing by Greenpeace, and thus swayed; Graham Young moves to an argument about media culpability.
DAVID LATIMER (Jan 19) noticed a cloud formation that does appear in both ICR and Greenpeace vision of the incident. During the unfolding of the drama, about one minute, that same cloud formation "moves" about 45 degrees- four o'clock around to seven o'clock, as an observer on board the Nisshin Maru would see it.
Of the vision provided by Greenpeace, an establishing shot taken from an inflatable near the bow of the stationary Oriental Seabird shows the same cloud formation. Thence, Arctic Sunrise can be seen to maintain the same heading (not course!) for about 25 seconds; until Nisshin Maru obscures the superstructure of the Oriental Seabird, which I use as reference.
As the expert suggested, only GPS datalogging will reveal the truth.

Have you seen the too frequent picture of a car wrapped around a pole? Graham Young would have us believe the pole did it

Clink, you're on the wrong side of the tree! Ramming is defined as prow to ship contact, and Greenpeace rammed the Arctic Sunrise. That is not a partisan statement, it is what _all_ the evidence says. They're the ones claiming that the tree jumped out in front of them.

Interesting that you and David can apparently pinpoint exact cloud formations in an overcast sky which allegedly show the Nisshin Maru turning so as to somehow force Greenpeace to hit them. Even Greenpeace doesn't claim this. If you listen to Rattenbury's voice-over he says that the Nisshin Maru moved to port _after_ the collision.

There's a whole public relations course in what not to do from this one incident. All Greenpeace had to say was "We rammed the other ship. We didn't mean to do it," and no-one would have been all that interested. It is the spin that is the issue, not whether the Nisshin Maru should have given right of way or not. You can ram another ship and still be in the right. But you'll negate the advantage of being in the right if you lie about having hit them. That's the issue.

Graham, I am having difficulty digesting your definition. What source is it you use?
The ICR, and Greenpeace both, have used the term to refer to the deeds of the other.

I made two mistakes in my previous post here.
-First,the name of the Panama registered tanker/cargo vessel is of course ORIENTAL BLUEBIRD.
-Second, I had given a figure of 45 degrees as being the deviation made by Nisshin Maru during the period of available footage. The ICR record alone accounts for 45 degrees of slew over a period of 28 seconds.( plus perhaps 5 seconds while the cameraman repositioned to the port side.)
- In total, the Nisshin Maru slewed about 80-90 degrees (four o'clock around to seven o'clock)

Response to GrahamY:

As I pointed out in my Dan Cass post, there are different meanings that can be attached to the word "ram". The specific naval meaning involving an attack using the prow of a ship does not apply, because it was not an attack.

Also there are no metaphoric "trees" on the ocean. We have two boats in motion.

To clarify, I remember discussing clouds moving in the ICR video but not the Greenpeace video. There was smoke in the Greenpeace video from the Sunrise engines, when according to others, it commenced reversing the engines, but to me it only showed that there was wind.

Finally, I don't believe the sofar evidence shows anything more than an accident, albeit in (and to some extent due to) an antagonistic environment.

Of course, we were not there, we don't have all the evidence and are not experts in maritime safty. We cannot call someone a liar based upon popular opinion - that's why we have courts and safty investigators