Whale Attacks Boat!

[mactastic]

Looks like the whales have gotten sick of the way we treat them and are getting some revenge! These people are lucky to have gotten away without injury.

Story (http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/europe/08/20/holiday.wale.reut/index.html)

LONDON, England (Reuters) -- A British family's holiday was rudely interrupted when a 30-foot (9-meter) whale crashed onto their sailing boat off the east coast of Australia.

The 10-ton humpback whale leapt out of the water and pulled the rigging and mast along with it as it slid down the boat, British media reported on Wednesday.

"I was below deck when there was a hell of a crash from port as it leapt out of nowhere," said Trevor Johnson, 61, who was on the boat with his wife, two sons and a son's girlfriend.

"It's amazing that no one was hurt or killed, but it was a terrifying experience," he told The Daily Telegraph.

[jadariv]

Poor whale probably didn't even know the boat was there. And now its injured and just floating there in the water. Man thats sad.

[Mr. Anderson]

They managed to get a pic of the whale, and that seems to be red tinged in the spray - I wonder why they haven't mentioned anything else about the whale.

But that's really weird - it would have totally freaked me out if I was on the ship. Although I'd probably start calling the captian Ahab and the whale Moby.....

D :D

[jxyama]

don't want to sound "righteous" or anything, but the proper headline probably should have been "a boat happens to be in the way of a whale, gets wrecked" or something along the line.

whales don't "attack." it was doing its thing and the boat happened to be in its way... bad luck, for both now injured whale and the vacationer...

pretty amazing story, nonetheless...

[Mr. Anderson]

actually it looked like the whale was trying to use the boat as a barnacle scraping device :D

Sad that it had to hurt itself....and I tried to find more info on the story, but a quick google search didn't pull up anything....

D

[mactastic]

Originally posted by jxyama
don't want to sound "righteous" or anything, but the proper headline probably should have been "a boat happens to be in the way of a whale, gets wrecked" or something along the line.

whales don't "attack." it was doing its thing and the boat happened to be in its way... bad luck, for both now injured whale and the vacationer...

pretty amazing story, nonetheless...

I was just having fun with the title. It was just a hook to get people to look. I feel bad for the whale too. I didn't mean to actually imply the whale did it deliberatly.

[Mr. Anderson]

Funny thing is, searching for the more to the story on google I found a couple links about the sighting of a white whale in Australia! :D

Moby Dick it is!

D

[wdlove]

I can certainly see why they would be in fear. It's unusal for a whale to come near a boat. Just happy to hear that the family and whale ar OK!

[jxyama]

Originally posted by mactastic
I was just having fun with the title. It was just a hook to get people to look. I feel bad for the whale too. I didn't mean to actually imply the whale did it deliberatly.

i know, i didn't really mean much in my response...

caught my attention, though, so well done. :D

i'm glad that the people on the boat are safe...

[748s]

it's an albino humpback called migaloo, well known in the area. these links have some information.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/australia/qld/townsville/regtnv-19aug2003-10.htm

http://www.abc.net.au/news/australia/qld/townsville/regtnv-19aug2003-4.htm

a picture.....
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s928007.htm

[jap4n]

i think the whale was one of those 'extremists' suicide boat squashing types...
:\

[zim]

So I was thinking about the last whale watch outing that I went on, we were out there for what seemed like hours and saw only a glimpse of a whales back, nothing more.

I only hope that the whale is okay.... oh and good to hear that the people are okay too, oh well for the boat, wonder if they had collision insurance.

Next week on Discover channel: When whales attack

[themadchemist]

Originally posted by jap4n
i think the whale was one of those 'extremists' suicide boat squashing types...
:\

yeah, sent out by those darn Anti-Western Arabs, they were, them there whales. Dangnabit! When are we gonna have our cotton-pickin' war on the Sea! Osama, Saddam, next up: Poseidon! :D

[Capt Underpants]

Why are some saying it was the sailor's fault? The whale has eyes and it is in it's natural habitat . It should be able to stear clear of a boat.