Fishermen volunteer to become 2nd right whale rescue team (Canada)
July 25, 2019
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/north-atlantic-right-whales-crab-fishermen-1.5221729?fbclid=IwAR2sjdiMiNoecyzgBqMoORERsrzXLpeIpd5DErD23FDFCrocW5ZuDNh2aDU
(There were 3 Right Whales entangled and they have freed 2 of them, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/right-whales-entangled-gulf-of-st-lawrence-1.5203457).
Stéphane Ferron is close enough to touch the whale he's trying to free. The five-year-old North Atlantic right whale is wrapped up in nylon fishing rope. It's weighed down by an unknown something, trailing into the depths of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The whale has come up to the surface for air, and Ferron and the rest of the rescue team have precious minutes to assess the entanglement and cut the rope before it dives back down. It's dangerous to be this close. One flip of the tail and the whale can do irrevocable damage to the small rescue vessel and the people on it. That's what caused the death of Joe Howlett, a volunteer whale rescuer who was trying to disentangle a North Atlantic right whale. But the team has to be that close.
"We have no choice, because we have to get close to see where the cables are and the configuration of the entanglement," Ferron said in French. Ferron has only done this a handful of times. He's been a crab fisherman for two decades and feels a responsibility to help the endangered whales. "These entanglements are created by the fishing industry, so somewhere someone has to do something," he said. Ferron is one of three crab fishermen who volunteered to form a new rescue team based in Shippagan. He, Martin Noël and Rémi Guignard have been training since last winter. The objective is to eventually have a boat to respond quickly to disentanglement calls in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
Members of the Campobello Whale Rescue Team
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"These entanglements are created by the fishing industry, so somewhere someone has to do something,"
Damn fishing nets.
