Even staunchest advocates of traditional whaling in the Faroe Islands have condemned Sunday’s “cruel and unnecessary” massacre of a superpod of nearly 1,500 dolphins, which were driven into shallow waters off Skálabotnur beach in the island of Eysturoy and they were left writhing for hours before being killed.
The Sea Shepherd group, which has been campaigning to stop the traditional Faroese “Grind” hunt since the 1980s, has claimed that Sunday’s hunt was “the largest slaughter of dolphins or pilot whales in the history of the islands “, with more animals that died than a whole season in the famous” Cove “of Taiji, Japan.
This time, however, the scale of the murder was such that even many Faroese, who often regard hunting as part of their cultural heritage, expressed disgust.
“I’m sick of seeing this kind of thing,” one commenter said on the Facebook page of local station Kringvarp Føroya, with another describing the massacre as “totally terrible,” saying, “I’m ashamed to be Faroese. “.
Heri Petersen, who chairs the local Grind Hunting Association in the bay where the murder took place, said there were too many dolphins in the bay too far away, with few people waiting on the beach to kill them. , prolonging his agony.
“I am appalled by what happened,” he told the local In.fo news site. “The dolphins were lying on the beach writhing too much before killing them.”
Hans Jacob Hermansen, former president of the Faroese Grind Association, which campaigns for the survival of traditional hunting, told local Kringvarp station Føroya that he was surprised by the event, which he said “destroys all the work we have done to preserve the Grind ”.
“The world has become much smaller today, with everyone walking with a camera in their pocket,” said his successor, Ólavur Sjúrðarberg. “This is a gift for those who wish us badly when it comes to Grind.”
The Grind is significant to many Faroese residents, with spectators coming out to see from the coast and the meat of the catch traditionally shared among the families who took part, with an excess that was shared among the local villagers.
But a local told the Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet that there was no way the locals wanted to consume so much dolphin meat.
“I guess most dolphins will be thrown in the trash or a hole in the ground,” they said. “We should have quotas by district and we shouldn’t kill dolphins.”
Captain Alex Cornelissen, the world’s first Sea Shepherd executive, who campaigns against whaling, said in the midst of a global pandemic it was “absolutely horrible to see an attack on the nature of this scale in the Faroe Islands.” .