An anecdote from the fairly recent history of North Sea Oil and Gas and a Norwegian Fisherman, Whaler and Parliamentarian by name Steinar Bastesen:
Seen here in 2009, dressed in his signature Sealskin vest;
In another thread I mentioned the decommissioning of the Brent Spar in 1998:
It became a headache for Shell when Greenpeace force them to changed plans:
A few months later, buoyed by the success against mighty Shell, some Greenpeace activists decided to stop a whaler from sailing from Tromsø at the start of the Minke Whale season:
They picked the wrong boat to chain themselves to the mast on.M/V Bastesen:
Most of the crew, incl. the skipper, Steinar Bastesen had gone to the famous Ølhallen (Beerhall) at Mack’s Brewery for a pint or two before sailing:
https://www.mack.no/en/olhallen
When they were told of the uninvited guests onboard their boat the returned to find some young hippies with with signs walking around the deck chanting slogans and a couple of the chained with handcuffs to the mast. What followed became world news.
Here is LA Times report:
AS bit of Hollywood style reporting, but according to Steinar himself it went something like this;
- Get off my boat you &%$##
- No, you stop killing whales.
- Where is the key to the handcuffs?
- We don’t have any keys.
Steinar to his crews; go fetch the cutting torch.
The two at the mast had one good look at Steinar and decided that he was not Shell.
According to Steinar they found the key pretty quickly.
He swore he never even lite the torch.
Nor did he throw the girl overboard, he just told her he would if she didn’t get off herself.
Steinar iss a man of his word. He said what he meant and meant what he said, so I have no reason to doubt him.
Just like when he swore he didn’t tell “Capt” Watson of Sea Shepherds that he would kill him.
Steinar Bastesen actually shot his first whaled at 14 and his last at 71.
He also fished Tuna off Somalia and appeared at the UN General Assembly to speak for the whalers.
At 65 I tried to recruit him for a a fishing project in the Maldives that didn’t succeed.
No it is not a made up story. People like him actually existed in the North of Norway.