The Science
Patagonian toothfish are not the only species being decimated by pirate fishing vessels. The science team on board the Arctic Sunrise documents the impact pirate fishing has on a wide array of bird species in the Southern Ocean.Don't forget to feast your eyes on our Bird of the Week!

Longline Fishing
What is longline fishing and why is it so detrimental to a variety of wildlife?

Campaign Report
Track the progress of our campaign by checking out these periodic reports from Greenpeace's onboard campaign team.

Ship Log & Webcast
What's daily life like on a Greenpeace ship? How does the crew prepare for these dramactic actions? And just what is a bosun anyway? Get first hand accounts from our crew.

Last Year
In 1999 Greenpeace embarked on an expedition to expose pirate fishing in the Southern Ocean and caught the notorious, Spanish-owned pirate vessel Salvora illegally fishing in the French waters around Kerguelen Island. Here's an overview of that campaign...

Ship Log: Tough weather thwarts efforts to confiscate pirate fishing gear

Buoys mark the location of an abandoned pirate longline. These 'ghost' lines, set illegally in the Southern Ocean, often stretch for several kilometers and are "repeat offenders" - fish and other marine wildlife feed on the fish and birds initially hooked on the line and could then become hooked themselves.

the Arctic Sunrise
11 March - 18 March

11 March Saturday
I had the 4 am to 8 am watch and for the third morning in a row we are accompanied by a black-browed albatross. The orange stripe across its breast indicates that it is part of someone's marking experiment. During my watch I saw a shooting star and also watched a satellite trace an ark across the night-sky.

At 10;00AM we began to confiscate the pirate fishing gear we discovered a few days ago. In addition to simply disabling this illegally set fishing line, we want to document the devastation that these longlines wreak on the marine environment. Tens of thousands of seabirds get hooked and drowned on pirate long lines each year. Pirate fishing for Patagonian toothfish in the Southern Ocean are driving many species, in addition to the toothfish, to the brink of extinction.

We started with the marker buoys and then were able to get about 1000 yards of fishing line on the deck. We encountered a huge knot consisting of the rest of the rope entangled about an anchor-weight. After much manoeuvring we succeeded in getting the whole hideous mess aboard, hooks and all!

It is such a shame! Not content with polluting the parts of this planet where we live, humanity also dumps all this fishing gear at sea thousands of miles from anywhere! How much marine life has it killed just drifting aimlessly?

Late afternoon brought foul weather and brutal waves which struck the ship with such force that the whole structure shook. We had to cut the line for safety reasons but at least we were able to disable it. Rather than get bounced about by the waves we decided to steam toward another set of buoys discovered near by. Weather permitting, we'll try to haul this line tomorrow.

12 March Sunday
4AM -8 AM watch. After a stormy, bumpy night, a stormy, bumpy morning. Outside the sea heaves about in great grey mountains of water capped with white froth. We climb up one side of these enormous waves and then crash down into the "valley" on the other!

As it's Sunday we took it easy and relaxed by lurching around the ship and bouncing off the walls! I decided to construct in cardboard the "skeletons" for my papier-mâché minke whale, toothfish and wandering albatross.

Despite the weather some extremely active hourglass dolphins were sighted today, one almost behaving like a spinner dolphin; i.e. jumping & rotating around its longitudinal axis.

13 March Monday
4AM -8 AM watch. Seas remain choppy. As it is too foul to haul the fishing line, we removed the lights from the buoys and resumed search mode - two observers on the bridge wings are relieved each hour.

Monday means heavy duty cleaning day for me. I was eager to go and keep lookout so I quickly cleaned three sets of alleyways and the engine room.

The sea made it too rough to spot anything so we decided to cancel the watch and go elsewhere to search for pirates. Severely disappointed I decided to go and stand outside anyway! I did spot some kelp mats, wandering, light-mantled sooty albatrosses, Wilson's storm petrel, white-chinned petrel and some prions.

14 March Tuesday
Rough seas! Misty morning. 4AM- 8AM watch.

What does one do on watch? Well, besides annoying the Mate on duty, every hour I patrol of the ship, primarily to look out for any fires; but also to make sure nothing lashed down has come loose. For example-one rough night a foam mattress on top of one of the containers in the hold had crept loose, and was overhanging a work-light, thus becoming a potential fire-hazard (lights are hot).

Patrols take me to the engine room, the hold, the lower hold, the stern thruster room (both sides), the poop deck, the laundry, the lounge and back to the bridge. I also check the thermometers outside the freezer and the cold room, make sure the tea-towels have been washed, folded and returned to the galley (sailor-talk for kitchen), the "elephant skins" (sort of a net table cloth, that prevents slipping) are on the tables, all port holes and hatches are secure, check that the helicopter and inflatables are firmly lashed down, relieve the Mate on the bridge "when Nature calls"( -"hey, where'd you say the brake for this thing is?" ) and lastly I have to wake everyone up at the correct time.

Today I also put a gloss coat on the potato peeler and undercoat on some more tools. Emily, another deckie, also known as Doctor Evil, will relieve me tonight on the 4AM -8 AM watch so I can get a decent night's sleep!!

15 March Wednesday
HOORAY! I'm off night watches! At sea I find my dreams become quite vivid, taking on a quality that far exceeds the selection of videos available!

Painted more 'things' today: boxes, tools etc. We had an unexpected encounter today when we were buzzed by a French helicopter (a Dauphin, I believe) as we both continue to search for illegal longliners.

Although bumpy the weather isn't too bad. Did some more work on my models too.

16 March Thursday
Continuing in search mode. Seas choppy. Cleaned lounge. Printed some Hypothermia Instructions (advice for treatment for people exposed to extreme cold - you actually have to be very careful in warming them up, as you run the risk of forcing the chilled blood from the extremities into the heart, causing heart failure.) Did a bit more work on the potato peeler, applied another coat of paint to the rope ladder boxes that will eventually go on deck. Continued working on my models.

The sea became increasingly "bouncy" from dinner -time onwards.

17 March Friday
Out-door work, at last! I put "metal-save" (vaseline for nuts!) on the bolts used to secure the hatch on the port diesel tank. Scrubbed off the rust and put on a coat of undercoat - all with the backdrop of the Southern Ocean.

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