Environmentalist injured trying to stop whaling (From Your Local Guardian)

Environmentalist injured trying to stop whaling

1:58pm Thursday 5th February 2009 in Richmond By Chris Wickham

The Green Party’s candidate for the Twickenham seat at the next general election has been injured while trying to prevent whaling in Antarctica.

Steve Roest, who has lived in the St Margarets area since 1989, required five stitches in a head wound after an incident yesterday.

He was on board the vessel Steve Irwin in the Ross Sea, in the South Pacific Ocean, as part of a project to stop all whaling activities in the area.

The ship’s captain Paul Watson reported a group of Japanese whalers attempting to harpoon a Fin whale turned a Long Range Acoustical Device on the ship, two small boats sent out to try and protect the whale and a helicopter filming the action before the whalers attempted to ram the boat at full speed.

Mr Roest was reportedly injured when he became dizzy and disoriented and was knocked down cutting open his head.

The ship’s doctor David Miller said he was now resting comfortably.