Protesters Don’t Stop Trawler Greenpeace Activists Tie Themselves To Boat To Protest Overfishing

Greenpeace protesters angry over factory fishing chained themselves to a factory trawler for 10 hours Tuesday, then dangled from a city bridge in an unsuccessful effort to keep the ship from sailing.

The trawler Pacific Scout sailed out of Lake Union on Tuesday night through a web of six protesters hanging from ropes affixed to the Aurora Bridge.

The trawler was bound for the Ballard Locks and on to Alaska waters.

Seven protesters who boarded the ship early Tuesday left the vessel after 10 hours and were arrested for criminal trespass, police said.

Six other Greenpeace protesters rappelled off the bridge at dusk and dangled some 50 feet above the lake. Two held a sign reading “Factory Trawling Guts Family Fishing.”

The bridge roadway is 175 feet above the water.

As the trawler sailed through the hanging protesters, it bumped a Greenpeace inflatable motor boat and pushed it along the Lake Washington Ship Canal.

After about a mile, the two protesters in the inflatable appeared to pull away from the trawler and then climbed aboard a police patrol boat.

The two men were arrested for investigation of obstructing vessel traffic and reckless endangerment, Sgt. Terry Jackson said.

The onboard activists were persuaded by police negotiators to abandon the trawler late in the afternoon, police spokesman Sean O’Donnell said.

The protest was designed to call attention to overfishing and waste by factory ships in the north Pacific, said Cristina Mormorunni, a spokeswoman for the environmental organization.

Three protesters had chained themselves to one side of the 236-foot Pacific Scout to prevent the ship from leaving the dock. Four others commandeered the left gantry and displayed hand-painted signs that flapped gently in the breeze: “No Fish, No Future.”

About 55 Seattle-based trawlers will be heading for Alaska over the next two weeks for the pollock season Aug. 15.

“Our activists did the best job that they could,” Mormorunni said. “Greenpeace has been successful today because it has raised the profile of this issue today.

She contended factory trawlers in 1994 threw overboard 569 million pounds of dead fish.

“We feel this level of waste is unconscionable, it’s not acceptable and cannot be viewed as the cost of doing business,” Mormorunni said.

“I can’t really see why people need to break the law to bring their point across. This issue needs to be debated and resolved because it’s complex issue,” said Joe Blum of the American Factory Trawler Association. “It’s not a conservation issue. There are just too many people out there catching the same number of fish.”

The Pacific Scout has a crew of 80.

Seattle-based American Seafoods Co., which owns the Pacific Scout, could have lost about $50,000 each day the trawler did not fish, company spokesman Jan Jacobs.

Jacobs said he understood Greenpeace’s concerns but didn’t think American Seafoods’ fishing habits fell into the category the group was targeting.

“We have the lowest bycatch rate in any fishery in the world - less than 3 percent - and our company does not compete with small family fishers. We have not had any competition or complaints so far,” Jacobs said.

Bycatch is the term for fish and shellfish caught and discarded by vessels because they are the wrong species, sex or size.