SEAFOOD GUIDE
At ADEX Singapore 2017, I was
handed some drone footage that
showed a trans-shipment of sharks
from 15 industrial fishing boats just
200 metres offshore in East Timor.
At the same time, I was also given a
message that the Nobel Peace Prize
winner, Dr Jose Ramos Horta, the
former Prime Minister/President
of East Timor, was asking if Sea
Shepherd could help in the same
matter. After reviewing the footage,
we began an investigation into the
Hong Long fleet that was licenced to
fish in East Timor. We tracked and
monitored the mothership, which was
first going to China to unload then
onwards across the Pacific near the
Galápagos. Upon seeing the Fu Yuan
Yu Leng 999 meeting with several
fishing boats, I notified our CEO,
Captain Alex Cornellisen, who used
to head our operations in Galápagos.
Two days later, the ship was arrested
inside the Galápagos National Park
with 300 tons of shark on-board. The
crew were placed in prison and the
ship was confiscated.
Our investigation into the 15
vessels operating in East Timor
was uncovering a lot of strange
anonomlies. The fleet was claimed
to be owned by Pingtan Marine
Enterprises (PME) listed on the US
Nasdaq, yet all signs pointed to them
being owned by Hong Long Fisheries
based in Fuzhou, China. The case
became even more interesting when
we discovered that the husband ran
one company and the wife ran the
other company, and “assets” were
switched regularly between them.
Also, the fact that the Pingtan fleet
had made the news when they were
kicked out of Indonesia by Fisheries
Minister Ms Susi Pudjiastuti for illegal
fishing made them a target of interest.By: Gary Stokes, Sea Shepherd GlobalAfter receiving a tip-off regarding illegal fishing boats in
East Timor, Sea Shepherd departed on a mission to hunt
down the fleetHunting a Shark Fleet
RIGHT: PNTL Officer inspecting fish hold
IMAGE: Gary Stokes, Sea ShepherdWe devised a plan to send Sea
Shepherd’s newest vessel, MV Ocean
Warrior, on a recon mission to hunt
down the fleet that was operating
in waters offshore unseen by the East
Timor authorities, who sadly lack the
patrol capabilities to police their own
waters offshore. Our mission was to
find and document the fleets’ activities
and share this information with the
Timorese authorities in the hopes that
they would reconsider issuing a new
annual fishing permit to Hong Long.
The MV Ocean Warrior left
Freemantle covertly and headed to the
waters south of East Timor where we
began our search patterns. After two
weeks of fruitless searching, we were
starting to think that they had already
left for China when a target appeared
on our radar. Keeping the MV Ocean
Warrior over the radar horizon,
we launched the small boat just
before sunset so that the crew could
approach under the cover of darkness.
We found two white Chinese-
flagged longline type vessels, the
Fu Yuan Yu 836 and 839. These were
not our targets, but we proceeded to
close in and monitor their activities.
They had just set their driftnets- the “curtains of death” – which
are indiscrimate killers, capturing
anything and everything swimming in
the top 12 metres of water. Because
of this, the international community
passed a law that they are not to
exceed 2.5 kilometres in length.
The small boat crew approached
the end marker beacon silently and
logged its position on the GPS before
carefully cruising along the net in
complete darkness, being careful
not to become its prey by fouling the
propellers. This first net was 10.2
kilometres in length and when we got
to the end, we noticed another beacon
just 50 metres away; this was the start
of a second net that we recorded at
11.6 kilometres. These two vessels
were setting over 20 kilometres of
driftnet each per night, a completely
illegal activity which we reported to all
relevant authorities.
Returning to the ship, our small
boat crew had little time to rest when
a new target appeared on the radar.
Launching again, we slowly approached
and began to stalk the vessel. As I
looked through the binoculars at the
light configuration, this vessel was
different; it was one of the 15 – Bingo!
We had found our target. We returned
to the MV Ocean Warrior and followed
it as it moved off. A few hours later, I
was awoken and called to the bridge.
There on the radar were all 15 vessels,
at anchor above a bank, 150 kilometres
south of East Timor in an area disputed
between East Timor and Australia due
to oil rights.
We closed in and sailed right through
the fleet, this time not hiding, while
compiling a photo log of each vessel
before pulling alongside the Fu Yuan
Yu 9608, which was starting to haul in
its bottom-set gillnets. We documented
the catch coming up which mostly
consisted of sharks and broken coral.
Besides removing the apex predators,
this fleet was destroying the corals on
the seabed without a care. We launched
the drone to capture more footage to
add as evidence later. After hauling
their nets, the entire fleet headed
north to East Timor, rounding the
easternmost point and sheltering in a
bay at Com. With evidence in hand, we
took the MV Ocean Warrior up to full
speed and headed west to the capital
of Dili, where we met our onshore
contacts and shared the footage with
members of the Policia Nationale Timor
Leste (PNTL).