Yes, Italy has a Coast Guard, just like we do, and they spend a good deal of their time trying to stop things like the use of drift nets, which are very illegal, in the Mediterranean.
This video gives us their rescue of a small pod of five sperm whales which had gotten caught up in drift nets. Considering the size of adult sperm whales, these gentle giants stayed in place until they were freed from those nets. Unlike gill nets, which people dump endlessly in the Gulf of Baja, these are made of heavy-duty cords and are elastic, but are just as lethal as the gill nets.
We need to make illegal and BAN drift nets so they won’t be used in the Med! Oh…wait..never mind.
BZ to the Eye talian Coasties. Maybe the whales can avoid a Japanese Whaler too.
That may be why they’re in the Med.
I get the Drift on the nets.
That was a nice feel-good story to begin the day with. Many thanks, Ex-PH2.
You’re welcome!
Back in the 50’s and 60’s we had Swordfish three days a week.
North Atlantic Swordfish. Not that yellow stuff from Florida.
A good size fish was 250 lbs and the Boston area had many
fish markets with plenty of fresh fish.
By the late 90’s the big catch was only 80 lbs and you had
to be there when it came in. The bumper sticker of the time
was “Save the Whales” and the Aquariums went up and the Greenpeace boats went out and the kids were introduced to
“Save Willy”
By Y2K (remember that?) Restaurants were being shamed for
serving Swordfish. Even fake Swordfish. Climate change had
not even been born yet.
Today, Lobsterman are being blamed for injuring Whales.
Whales eat fish. They have been depleting the Georges Banks
of Swordfish for decades. The liberals blame everything but
the Whales. Screw the Whales. Screw the bleeding heart
Liberals that hate everything nice. We should bring back
Whaling out of New Bedford and Gloucester.
Get rid of the Whales and the fish will come back.
Don’t even get me started on Cod.
Whatever happened to animal planets whale wars???
Every time I ever watched that I rooted for the Japanese Whalers, the whales that they “Research” aren’t even a Threatened Species!
API;
How about the episode where the do gooders went to Norway where there were Legal non threatened whale taking that was going on for hundreds of years and the do gooders tried stopping them.
I remember seeing part of an episode where they got greeted at a dock by some locals who cut their mooring lines and let their gangplank fall into the water. The attitude of said locals was something like “Set foot off of your damn boat here and you’re gonna be in some PAIN!!
Correction:
Free Willy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Willy
Molto bene, il mio Italiano fratelli!
Gill nets are banned in the entire North Pacific. They were legal west of 170E back in the ’70s. Caught some east of that line back in the day, but the perps ran away and left them for us to pull. What a mess. Birds, everything. Indiscriminate killing.
Still have those who have to try to get away with it, unfortunately.
I like their maritime patrol aircraft, Piaggio P180:
https://www.jetphotos.com/photo/7631494
It looks like a flying shrimp.