ClearChannel has generously offered SAVE THE FROGS! free advertisement space in five major U.S. airports: Chicago O’Hare, Midway, Denver International, St. Louis, and Detroit. But we have to pay the costs of printing the posters, and it’s not cheap!

CAN YOU DONATE $20 TODAY SO THAT WE CAN GET THIS FULL-SIZE PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT UP IN AIRPORTS NATIONWIDE?

Some of these ad spots are seven feet high, so thousands of passengers, including politicians, businessmen and lobbyists will see these. The more posters we can print, the more effective our campaign will be.

If there were ever a day to take action, it’s today, the International Day of Climate Action.

Please support this effort and help us stop climate change and save Yellowstone’s frogs.
Thanks!

Oh yeah, be sure to read our page on climate change, its effect on frogs, and how you can reduce your carbon footprint!
www.savethefrogs.com/climate

While governmental action is an integral part of stopping global warming, every one of us is responsible for reducing our own carbon footprint. Here are eight easy ways you can do your part:

Turn off the lights
If you’re not in the room (or the house), you probably don’t need the lights on. Same with your office-place, and those lights in the parking lot. Try solar power for outside lights.

Don’t purchase bottled water
Plan ahead and fill your re-usable bottle. Not only is plastic produced from oil, but it takes fuel to get that bottle of water from the source to the store at which you buy it..

Eat less meat
Cows live in pastures, which means rainforests worldwide are being destroyed to make way for cows. Without the rainforests to trap carbon, we don’t stand much of a chance at fighting global warming. But that’s not it: cows, pigs, sheep and goats are responsible for about 30% of America’s methane emission — and methane is far worse for the environment than is carbon dioxide!

Take shorter showers
There is a high chance your hot water is being heated by electricity generated at a coal-fired power plant.

Don’t fly first-class
Airplanes produce significant quantities of carbon emisions, and those spacious first-class seats take up 50% more space than do normal seats. That means you’e responsible for 50% more of that plane’s carbon emissions than economy passengers.

Invest in environmentally-friendly businesses
If a company puts effort into improving their environmental practices, they likely have some information about it on their website. Do some reseach prior to investing, and then give your support to companies with positive environmental track records.

Drive less. Buy and rent smaller cars.
Eat at a restaurant closer to home, or stay home and eat. Get yourself a good book and try the local public transport sometime (it’s probably improved since the last time you used it!). And next time you buy or rent a car, go with a fuel-effcient small car unless you have a true need for a large vehicle.

Donate to SAVE THE FROGS!
Help us get our “My Ponds Are Drying Up” posters up in airports around the country so that tens of thousands of people know what climate change is doing to frogs, and so they come to the savethefrogs.com website and educate themselves on ways to reduce their carbon footprint. ClearChannel graciously donates the advertising space to SAVE THE FROGS!, but we need to pay the printing costs. Even $10 helps, so please chip in!

Sea Shepherd News
http://www.seashepherd.org

Friday, February 20, 2009
Australian Federal Police Seize Whale War Videos
The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society ship Steve Irwin arrived in Hobart, Tasmania at 1700 Hours on February 20th. The ship was met at dockside by a party of Federal Australian Police officers who boarded the Steve Irwin with a warrant.

The warrant authorized the seizing of “all edited and raw video footage, all edited and raw audio recordings, all still photographs, producer’s notes, interview transcripts, production meeting minutes, post production meeting minutes as well as the ship’s log books, global positioning system records, automatic radar plotting aid, purchase records, receipts, financial transaction records, voyage information and navigational plotted charts.”

The Animal Planet series Whale Wars was very embarrassing to the Japanese government and the Japanese whaling industry in 2008. Japan does not wish to see the airing of the second season of Whale Wars and is putting as much diplomatic pressure on Australia as they possibly can to prevent further exposure of their illegal whaling operations in the Southern Ocean.

“I wish that the Australian government would apply the same “diplomatic” pressure on Japan to end their illegal whaling operations,” said Captain Paul Watson. “The Rudd government was elected on a promise to take the Japanese whaling industry to court for their illegal whaling activities. Now they seem to be more interested in taking Sea Shepherd to court for our efforts to intervene against illegal whaling operations.”

Captain Paul Watson said he would welcome a trial.

“We have to start somewhere so it may as well be by taking me to court. Let us get the evidence on the table and although a trial against Sea Shepherd and myself may not allow the introduction of evidence about Japan’s illegal whaling operations, it at least will give us the forum to present our evidence. Let’s see the Australian government bring the Japanese whale killers to Australia to bear witness against Sea Shepherd and Animal Planet and let’s see them appear as witnesses for the government of Australia that professes to be against whaling.”

“It’s a very one-sided affair,” continued Captain Watson. “The Japanese ships have not been boarded by the Australian Federal Police; they have not had their video and navigational data confiscated. They have not been questioned nor will they be, yet they violently attacked my ship and crew in the Southern Ocean. Does the law only go to bat for those who destroy nature’s creation? Are we about to see the ultimate kangaroo court where Sea Shepherd will be legally crucified because the Australian government has not lived up to their promise of taking the whale killers to court? The truth is that we would not have to be in the Southern Ocean defending the whales if the governments of the world would simply enforce the international conservation treaties they once so proudly signed into law. Without enforcement there is no law – just ecological anarchy.”

Captain Watson said he had no complaints about the Australian Federal Police.

“They were very professional and polite and they were doing their job in carrying out the orders of the government.”

“We have quite the year ahead of us,” continued Captain Watson. “We need to repair damages to the Steve Irwin, we need to secure a second and faster vessel, and we need to be prepared to return to the Southern Ocean again at the end of the year to defend whales. If need be we will be in court to answer to charges of defending endangered whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary and to this we proudly plead guilty.”

February 5th, 2009
Captain’s Blog
A Very Tense Day of Saving Whales
By Captain Paul Watson

Today was one of the most intense confrontations that I have ever experienced. Our one ship the Steve Irwin was aggressively attacked by the entire Japanese whaling fleet..

Three of the vessels, the hunter killer harpoon ships are faster and more manoeuvrable than us and the fourth, the factory ship, the one we call the Cetacean Death Star is eight times larger and armed with six very new and extremely powerful water cannons. All four ships are equipped with Long Range Acoustical Device weapons systems called LRAD’s.

It all started this morning on the fifth day that we have prevented the whaling fleet from killing any whales. One of the harpoon vessels had uncovered its grenade tipped harpoon and was bearing down on a defenceless Fin whale.

Two small boats from the Steve Irwin were launched to block the harpoon and our helicopter took off to document the action.

The small boats were moving between the harpooner and the factory ship when two crewmembers on the Nisshin Maru aimed the LRAD directly at our pilot Chris Aultman.

Chris said that immediately he heard a rattling sound in his helmet and then he felt the vibrations in his legs and chest. He retreated before the device could disorient or confuse him. We were all shocked that they would target the helicopter. The chopper was not a threat to the whaling ships, it was involved in documentation only. It was completely irresponsible to aim that devise at an aircraft. The potential to have caused our helicopter to crash was very real and very intimidating.

Ashley Dunn from Tasmania, a camerman with Animal Planet filming for the series Whales Wars from the helicopter reported experiencing the same sensations as Chris Aultman.

Suddenly the two inflatable boats were struck by LRAD sonic blasts from the factory ship and one of the harpoon vessels. Steve Roest from Britain became instantly dizzy and fell forward cutting open his head above the left eye.

As I watched this unfolding I suddenly found I had some serious problems of my own. The two other harpoon vessels were moving in fast directly towards the Steve Irwin and they were both on a collision course with us.

As they approached closer we saw them man the LRAD devices and we saw one of the vessels trailing a long prop fouling rope.

What began then was a four hour ordeal of zigzagging and avoiding that rope, a task made very difficult with the sonic blasts causing physical discomfort.

I decided that the best move to avoid the fouling ropes was to steer into the approaching whalers to out intimidate them. It was a twisting, churning, chase as they sought to disable us and I fought the wheel to avoid them, a chase made even more dangerous when the third ship began to move towards us.

As I moved away towards the port side in the direction of the Nisshin Maru I was attempting to pass the factory ship on her starboard side when suddenly the massive hull of that ship turned in towards us. As I turned away from it, the Nisshin Maru kept turning into the Steve Irwin and forcing us back towards the harpoon boats.

The harpoon boats were whipping about like bi-planes in a dog fight so I radioed the two small inflatables, the Delta and the Gemini to act like fighter planes and cut off the attack of the hunter killer boats.

The two small boats made courageous and direct fast runs on the bows of the whalers, enduring the sonic blasts to throw small lines to foul the props of the attacking boats. Each time they did this they succeeded in turning the harpooner away from us.

When a harpoon boat would get by them, I was forced to make big S moves to keep them from crossing our bow.

The Japanese crew on the harpoon boats were throwing chunks of metal and ice at the inflatable boats. The water cannons came dangerously close.

Despite this the Gemini boat roared in and delivered 15 bottles of rotten butter onto the harpoon deck of the Yushin Maru #3, turning it into a nauseating stinkpot.

In order to keep the Nisshin Maru from attempting to ram the Steve Irwin, I dropped a long mooring line behind the ship to keep all the whalers off our tail.

But the harpoon boats with their superior speed kept moving closer and they came from three different sides.

If one of them succeeded in fouling our prop, we would be dead in the water, some two thousand miles from New Zealand or Australia. With the safety of my ship and crew in serious jeopardy, we had to evade these attacks

As the Yushin Maru # 1 pulled in close and was about to speed across our bow, I fired flares over them to scare them off. They retreated for a few moments and then moved back in again. This time I fired a line throwing rocket over top of them, laying down a long nylon rope directly across their deck. As the long line snaked overboard towards their prop, they backed off.

But all three of the harpooners kept coming in again and again. We could see the whalers on the deck flipping us off and throwing objects at the small boats. They were throwing pieces of lead and strangely enough golf balls.

During this melee the helicopter managed to land on the Steve Irwin to refuel and then lifted off again.

As the Yushin Maru # 3 moved in the Gemini caught their prop and brought the harpooner to a dead stop, knocking them out of the chase.

As the chase raged on across the Ross Sea I had to bring in the small boats and the helicopter before they all ran out of fuel.

But the Japanese whalers were not going to make that easy. The Nisshin Maru turned its massive bulk towards us and we saw it bearing down on us with its powerful water cannons spewing frigid high pressure water with the force of jackhammer. We were being caught in between the LRAD blasts from two harpoon vessels. I could not slow down and Chris Aultman was forced to land his machine on the back deck while we were moving at full speed.

Next came the retrieval of the small boats and that was going to be extremely dangerous with the two harpoon vessels moving in so close.

I decided to take a page from the Wild West and began doing circles. This circle the wagons move completely took the whalers off guard and they found they could not penetrate the circle to cross our bow without risking a major collision.

The Yushin Maru # 1 kept on our stern in the circle as the Yushin Maru # 2 moved counter clockwise around our clockwise circle. I then called in the boats and the recovery training that Bosun Dan Bebawi had been drilling into his deck crew paid off. The Gemini raced up along side inside the circle and hooked onto hook from the hydraulic crane as the ship continued the high speed circling. With the Gemini onboard, the Delta came in and was retrieved. It was a difficult procedure, especially with the sonic blasts making our bodies extremely uncomfortable. I found my head starting to ache and a tight feeling in my chest.

Finally with the boats and the helicopter safely onboard I turned counter clockwise and dropped a long mooring line behind the ship to force the harpooner trailing us to retreat.

We then sped towards the Nisshin Maru as I turned towards any of the harpooners that attempted to move in on us.

The Yushin Maru # 3 after an hour was able to disentangle the line from the prop and they were underway again.

Finally the harpooners sped off in different directions leaving us to continue our pursuit of the Nisshin Maru.

The crew were dazed by the LRAD’s but thrilled to know we had protected the safety of the ship. We had only three minor injuries. Five stitches for Steve and some ointment for the rope burn on my right hand. Laurens De Groot from the Netherlands received some wicked bruises on this fingers.

I had never in my life been attacked by four ships at once and it was a great relief to see them steam off away from us. We are however very prepared if they should return.

If the Japanese whalers thought we would be easily intimidated they learned very quickly that Sea Shepherd excels in the art of intimidation and quite frankly we have far more confrontational experience than these cowardly whalers who for the most part do little but shoot defenceless fleeing whales in the back.

And thus the day ended with our pursuit of the fleet resuming as we looked ahead to the sixth whale safe day.

Captain Paul Watson
Master – The Steve Irwin
Founder and President of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.
www.seashepherd.org

Jan 29th, 2009

• Hominid cockroaches scurry evilly over mutilated whales
• Nations weigh decisions on corrupted scales
• Talk, the excuse for doing nothing at all
• Diplomacy, the justification for the Japanese to stall

Sea Shepherd Returns From the Whale Wars
February 9th, 2009

10:00 Hours. (Sydney Time)

15:00 Hours (PST)

The Sea Shepherd ship the Steve Irwin and her crew have withdrawn from the Japanese whaling fleet to begin preparations to return with a faster and longer range ship.

“I have said always said that we would do everything we can short of hurting people to end illegal whaling in the Antarctic Whale Sanctuary.” Said Captain Paul Watson. “We have done everything we could with the resources available to us this year. We have shut down their illegal operations for over a month in total. We have cost them money and we have saved the lives of a good many whales. And although we are willing to take the risks required, even to our own lives, I am not prepared to do to the Japanese whalers what they do to the whales and the escalating violence by the whalers will result in some serious injuries and possibly fatalities if this confrontation continues to escalate.”

Captain Watson said that he has been operating at a disadvantage against three harpoon boats that are superior in speed and manoeuvrability to the Steve Irwin.

“We need to block those deadly harpoons and we need to outrun these hunter killer ships and to do that I need a ship that is as fast as they are and I intend to get one and I intend to return next year.” He said. “We will never stop intervening against their illegal whaling operations and we will never stop harassing them, blockading them and costing them money. I intend to be their on-going nightmare every year until they stop their horrific and unlawful slaughter of the great whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.”

This year the crew of the Steve Irwin pursued the Japanese fleet from December 18th until January 7th for over 2,000 miles, shutting down their operations for a month. The crew returned and relocated the fleet on February 1st and pursued them for another 9 days during which time the whalers were only able to kill five whales. A pursuit of the Yushin Maru #2 by the Steve Irwin on December 20th caused ice damage to the prop of the whaling ship and forced them out of operation for a month and a half. The harpoon vessel was denied repairs in Indonesia much to the embarrassment of Japan.

Confrontations between the Steve Irwin and the whaling fleet have resulted in numerous close calls and two collisions causing minor damage. The whaling fleet this year deployed Long Range Acoustical Devices (LRAD’s) and high powered water cannons against the Sea Shepherd crew. No whalers were injured. Three members of the Steve Irwin’s crew were injured with one man requiring five stitches above his left eye after being hit by a blast from the LRAD and knocked over.

Captain Paul Watson is dismissive of Japanese accusations that Sea Shepherd deliberately rammed their whaling ships “The whalers and their hired PR flunkies can say whatever they want now but we have over 1,000 hours of video footage documenting every moment of the campaign. Our story will be told on a weekly series on Animal Planet with the show Whale Wars. People can watch and judge for themselves. The camera is the most powerful weapon in the world and we intend to demonstrate that power.”

On January 31st, the Japanese government dispatched a security vessel called the Taiyo Maru #38 from Fiji to intercept the Steve Irwin. The ship is believed to be carrying a special boarding unit and has orders to seize the ship and all video evidence, according to a source in Fiji. The ship is expected to arrive in the Ross Sea within days.

“We cannot allow this documentation to be captured by Japan” Said Captain Watson.

The Steve Irwin will be returning to Australia and is expected to arrive within the next two weeks. The ship had only another four days of fuel reserves to remain with the fleet before being forced to return anyways.

“Another four days is simply not worth getting someone killed,” said Captain Watson. “We are down here because we respect the sanctity of life. The whalers are down here to illegally destroy life. People can choose to side with life or with death, between the whalers and the whale defenders, and we have chosen to defend life, and for those who condemn us for what we are doing, all I can say is that we are not down here for them. We’re down her for the whales.”

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