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The Thunder continues to take on water. Photos: Simon Ager and Jeff Wirth (Sea Shepherd Global)

Sea Shepherd crew say poaching ship may have been scuttled to conceal crimes

Sea Shepherd environmentalists claim stateless poaching vessel was intentionally scuttled off West African coast to destroy evidence

A notorious poaching vessel pursued by the Sea Shepherd environmental group has mysteriously sunk off the West African coast in an incident the green group suspects was a deliberate bid to conceal evidence.

Crew of the Thunder, a stateless ship which was allegedly operated by the Spanish fishing group Vidal Armadores, were rescued by the Sea Shepherd vessels, the Bob Barker and the Sam Simon. They had been shadowing the Thunder for 110 days since reporting that the crew of the Thunder had been using illegal gillnets to land vulnerable toothfish on the Banzare Bank in Antarctica on December 17.

The vessel's captain attempted a variety of manoeuvres to shake the environmental group, including coming close to ramming the Bob Barker, Sea Shepherd said, and insisting he had sufficient fuel and supplies to remain at sea another nine months.

On Monday afternoon, however, the ship issued a distress signal after entering the Exclusive Economic Zone of Sao Tome. The captain of the Thunder then radioed the Bob Barker to report that his vessel was sinking.

"They took to their life rafts and we very quickly had our zodiacs in the water to make sure all 40 of the crew were safe," Adam Burling said from Sea Shepherd's headquarters in Australia.

"To be honest, we were a bit worried about the safety of our own crew. They have tried to ram us in the past, they threw grappling hooks at our zodiacs and lengths of metal at the ship, but we did a risk assessment and we decided that we had to take the chance to make sure that all the crew were safe."

The Thunder's crew needed to be rescued.
The crew of the Thunder was taken aboard the two Sea Shepherd vessels without incident and were fed and provided with water. While the Thunder was sinking, three people from the Bob Barker boarded the vessel to document the situation aboard.

"When my chief engineer boarded the Thunder in the hours leading up to the sinking, he was able to confirm that there were clear signs that the vessel was intentionally scuttled," said Peter Hammarstedt, captain of the Bob Barker.

"Usually when a vessel is sinking, the captain will close all hatches so as to maintain buoyancy. However, on the Thunder, the reverse was done - doors and hatches were tied open and the fish hold was opened.

The crew of the Thunder were handed over to police in Sao Tome when the Bob Barker berthed there yesterday.

Sea Shepherd believes the owners of the ship ordered its deliberate scuttling in an attempt to avoid prosecution for their illegal operations in the Antarctic Ocean. But Burling says there is plenty of evidence to convict the crew of a ship that has long been on Interpol's wanted list and is part of a fleet of six vessels that have been identified as operating illegally.

"When we first found the Thunder - fishing, red-handed - they simply dropped their nets and made a run for it," Burling recalled. "The Sam Simon remained at that location and hauled in more than 72km of illegal gillnet over the following three weeks."

More than 1,400 fish, weighing some 45,000kg, were returned to the ocean from the outlawed nets that environmentalists describe as "walls of death". The confiscated gear was handed over in February to authorities in Mauritius.

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: Crew may have sunk ship to conceal crimes
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