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[Caro18 0]

Follow HSI/Canada's Rebecca Aldworth as she documents Canada's commercial seal kill, and take action to end this bloody business»


Posted 11:30 AM EST

So often the suffering of the seals during this slaughter is viewed at a distance.



"It takes a special kind of person to club and shoot helpless baby seals." HSI/Sanchez, 04-03-09

From the air, from thousands of feet, somehow the pain of the animals does not transmit properly.

You see them wriggling across the ice, blood trailing behind them. You see their mouths open in a silent scream through the camera lens.

But from the ice it is different. You hear their cries, you see them try to escape, you smell the blood and you feel their terror.

Yesterday, the ProtectSeals team travelled to the seal killing area by zodiac (a small, inflatable boat), documenting the slaughter from 30 meters away. We witnessed so many seals dying a horrible death, as sealers shot at the terrified babies, and then descended on the wounded, struggling animals with wooden bats.

I will never be able to forget the agonizing assault on one seal. The pup was in front of our zodiac, and a nearby sealing vessel approached. The pup sniffed the air as if sensing danger.

He looked around, and then the first bullet slammed into him. His scream could be heard all across the water. He tried to crawl away but another bullet ripped through his flesh.

His outraged cries echoed as a third and fourth and fifth bullet hit him. Finally, he dove into the water. He did not come back up. The sealers shrugged nonchalantly and moved on.

We looked around frantically for him but he did not surface. Likely, this baby seal would have bled to death slowly and painfully under the water, like tens of thousands of other seals that are "struck and lost" each year in this cruel slaughter.

I want the world to remember this brave seal. His cries of protest are echoing in my mind and I want them to sound across the world. I want everyone to hear as I did the mortal cries of a wounded baby seal who doesn't understand why he is being hurt.

And hearing those cries, know as I do that this slaughter simply has to stop.


The sealing boats headed out. The HSUS/Sanchez, 04-03-09

Despite Canada's assurances that this year the seal hunt will be humane, we filmed so much cruelty it is unbearable. Sealers were shooting at seals in open water, not bothering to retrieve the wounded animals.

So many pups were shot multiple times before the sealer approached and, realizing the seal was still conscious, beat the animals to death with wooden bats. Wounded seals were repeatedly allowed to slip beneath the water's surface, left to die slowly.

I have filmed this carnage for 11 years now, and this year is exactly the same as every other—filled with unspeakable suffering and unconscionable cruelty.

Not surprisingly, some sealers don't want us to film them. They were more aggressive toward our observers than ever before. Yesterday they made veiled threats about "ricocheting bullets" hitting us, and they pointed a rifle at us. Four sealing boats repeatedly tried to ram our zodiac, yelling threats all the while.

It takes a special kind of person to club and shoot helpless baby seals and threaten unarmed, peaceful observers. The sealers' cowardice speaks volumes. We won't be intimidated, and we won't go anywhere.

We are here to document the cruelty, and it is crucial work. For we know, as the sealers do, that our evidence will put this industry into the history books where it belongs.

Rebecca Aldworth is director of Humane Society International Canada (HSI Canada). For more than a decade, she has observed firsthand Canada's commercial seal hunt—escorting more than 100 scientists, parliamentarians and journalists to the ice floes to bear witness to the largest marine mammal slaughter on Earth.
http://www.hsus.org/marine_mammals/marine_mammals_news/live_from_the_ice_2009.html

[Animal 0]

[Cath10 0]

Ça doit être tellement difficile d'assister à ça, impuissant.