494 



by the Olympic Whaling Company of Panama ; its catchers belonged to a Hon- 

 dnran company. The majority stockholder of both companies was Aristotle S. 

 Onassis, an Argentinian citizen. 



From the l»eginning of its whaling operations the Olympic Whaling OomiMiny 

 was a sonrce of both irritation and suspicion to the Norwegian companies. The 

 Olj/mpic Challenger used Hamburg, Germany, as its home port and its company^ 

 agent there, the p]rste Deutsche Walfang Gesellschaft, was managed by the for- 

 mer administrator for Nazi Germany of the Norwegian whaling ships that were 

 captured and confiscated during World War II. The manager of the Olympic 

 Challenger and its fleet of catchers was a Norwegian citizen, once a member of 

 the Norwegian Nazi party, who had been manager of the German factory ship 

 Walter Ran. When the Olympic Whaling Company was being organized its agents 

 went to Norway to recruit skilled labor. The company was informed of the Nor- 

 wegian law prohibiting this but persisted and hired 15 gunners. The Norwegian 

 government and the Norwegian whaling companies did not forget the incident. 



Almost as soon as the Olympic Challenger began whaling, rumors began to 

 circulate among British, Japanese, and Norwegian whalingmen that the Pana- 

 manian ship was breaking many of the rules. In the vast spaces of the Antarctic 

 it was, not easy for whalingmen to observe each other's actions. The necessity of 

 killing as many whales as possible before the season ended left little time for 

 snooping. From time to time the Olympic Challenger was observed committing 

 infractions, but none of those occasions were as well documented as the following. 

 On January 13, 1955, the Japanese catcher Koyo Maru 2, operating with the 

 floating factory Honan Maru, found and photographed a marked humpback whale 

 carcass at 64° 12'S. 162° 21'W. The Olympic Challenger was the only other 

 factory ship in the vicinity at the time. The regulations then in force allowed 

 the killing of humpback whales only between January 20 and 23 inclusive. Five 

 days later the buoy boat Koyo Maru (used to retrieve carcasses) saw the Olym- 

 pic Challenger at 65° 47' S. 170° 50' W. When discovered, the Panamanian ship 

 cast adrift 4 humpback carcasses and moved behind a nearby iceberg. The Koyo 

 Maru approached to within 100 yards of the dead whales, photographed them, 

 and submitted a report of its findings to the International AVhaling Commission. 



The International Whaling Commission had no power to enforce its regula- 

 tions; it could only formulate them and lament infractions. But national gov- 

 ernments can enforce laws, and one of them did so with a vengeance. On Novem- 

 ber 15 and 16, 1954, units of the Peruvian navy and air force bombed and machine- 

 gunned ships of the Olympic Challenger expedition for operating within 200 miles 

 of the Peruvian coast. Five of the vessels were taken to port and detained for 

 weeks until a fine of $3 million was i>aid. The Peruvian action only temporarily 

 halted the operations of the fleet. Shortly thereafter, the Olympic Challenger 

 sailed for the Antarctic. 



Conclusive proof of the infractions committed by the Panamanian fleet was 

 finally obtained in the winter of 1955-56. Seven German citizens who served a 

 few seasons on the Olympic Challenger went to the Norwegian Consulate Gen- 

 eral in Hamburg and signed notarized aflSdavits describing the illegal whaling 

 practices they had witnessed. Among the men Avas the dentist who had also 

 acted as the expedition's assistant medical officer. Their testimony was reinforced 

 by photographs which they had taken of undersized whale carcasses, by diaries 

 of observances of infractions, and by photographs of the ship's logbook that 

 showed false reports of the catch had been submitted to the Bureau of Whaling 

 Statistics in Sandef jord, Norway. The following is a brief summary of the major 

 infractions witnessed by the German whalingmen of the Olympic Challenger: 



(1) During the autumn of 1954 the Panamanian factory ship reported a catch 

 of 2,348 sperm whales off the coast of Peru. The actual catch was 4.648 .sperm 

 whales, 285 blue whales, 169 fin whales, 105 humpbacks, and 21 sei whales. Of 

 the blue whales killed, 35 were 59 feet or less in length and 2 were less than 

 49 feet. It was forbidden to falsify catch reports. Also, it was illegal for factory 

 ships to catch baleen whales between the Antarctic and the Equator. 



(2) During the 1954/55 season in the Antarctic the Oltjmpi<i Challenger began 

 hunting baleen whales before the season opened on .January 7. 



(3) Whales were killed regardless of size. Baby sperm whales were shot before 

 they even had teeth. Some were only 5 meters long and must have been newly 

 born calves (a sperm whale averages 4 meters at birth). Many young whales 

 were shot, and on occasion 4 at a time were hauled on board by winch. Often a 

 whale w-as so small that it was only necessary to remove the harpoon and entrails 

 before the carcass was dropped whole into the cookers. 



