WesWorld

Hey guys,

I've been looking into designing a boat to break the global circumnavigation record, set by Earthrace in 2008, at 60 days, 23 hours, 49 minutes. Not only that, but she is powered by biodiesel, and has a zero-carbon footprint. Designed as wave-piercing trimaran, she (was) the coolest boat in the world She was destroyed in 2010 (as Ady Gil) when rammed and sunk by a Japanese whaling ship, the MV Shonan Maru 2.

Here is a picture of her:


Here are her specs :
Type: Wave-piercing trimaran
Displacement: 13 tons
Length: 78 feet (24 m)
Beam: 23 feet (7 m)
Draft: 4 feet (1.2 m)
Propulsion: 2 x 350 kW (540 hp) Cummins Mercruise - Gearboxes: ZF 305A (single speed)
Top speed: 32 knots (59.3 kph)
Range: 12,000 nautical miles (22,224 km) from 12,000 litres (2,640 imp gal) of fuel capacity
Crew: 4 to 8

Also, I am thinking of designing a boat (Earthrace 2) to beat the current record. She is going to be over 100 ft long and capable of over 40 knots (46 mph).
Weight should be around 50 tons or so. She is to be of the same wave-piercing design as the original Earthrace and aslo be powered by biodiesel.
What do you guys think? Should I design her?

I don't really consider it a shame when Sea Shepherds get their heads bashed.
As for the "ramming" nobody really knows what happened, but based on what I've seen of their navigational "skills" and seamanship I'm surprised they even made it to the Southern Hemisphere in the first place. (LEt's just say that watching the Steve Irwing trying to moor in Algeciras was fun so long as you didn't have to pay for the damages. Seriously, these people have no idea about what they're doing, are a danger to navigation and if it weren't for the massive media cover they've gotten they would have been arrested as pirates a long time ago.

My awful poetry skills at work.

It was a nice boat.

It is a shame about the boat.
It is a shame it is no more.
It is a shame it didn't remain afloat.
It obviously never happened before.

It is a shame that idiots controlled the boat.
Who thought they could sail across the sea.
And when Ady Gil was no longer afloat.
They wished it was made from a sturdy, big tree.

They thought that the Japanese would steer clear.
When parking the boat in front of the ship.
But the only thing heard from the Japanese was a sneer.
And they had no more boat for the return trip.

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based on what I've seen of their navigational "skills" and seamanship I'm surprised they even made it to the Southern Hemisphere in the first place.

Having seen some bits on TV, I'm pretty sure that they would never survive a trip across the English Channel.

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they would have been arrested as pirates a long time ago

You call 'em pirates, I call 'em eco terrorists.

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Originally posted by Rooijen10
You call 'em pirates, I call 'em eco terrorists.

Which is probably a much more apt description.

I watch Whale Wars, and find it generally amusing; it's the naval equivilent of slapfighting.

The Sea Shepherds talk a big game, playing up how they risk their lives for the whales, and how they're willing to do anything to stop the Japanese....but there's so many ways they could actually be effective at disabling those whaling ships, but they limit themselves to nuisance tactics because they don't really want to get arrested or inconvenienced. Likewise, the Japanese limit themselves to water hoses and the LRADs (which were demonstrably useless, from what I saw). Likewise, they refrain from truly defending themselves soley for PR reasons.

Yeah, the biggest dangers I've seen the Sea Shephards get into was entirely their own incompetance, like when they lose track of their Zodiacs, and don't notice until one of them breaks down 50 miles behind them.

That all being said, I'm not so quick to say the Japanese didn't see an opportunity to ram and sink Ady Gil, and went for it. And if that's the case, I think I'd actually applaud it, since If I'm gonna watch a show called Whale Wars, I think it's time we saw some decent warfare come into it.

Considering many of the members of The Sea Shepherds are aussies its rather two faced to demonise the Japanese for killing whales when the art of bashing Roo skulls on your back bumper is practically a national past time in Australia, so yeah I view them as eco terrorists and I'm sure the majority of ordinary people see them as such as well. When you use a ship such as Ady Gil in the way that she was on her last voyage I don't call it bravely fighting for whales, I call it willful stupidity. Thank god they don't get bigger vessels because they are a menace on the high seas that pretend to be pirates as the only thing they steal is someone else's 30 seconds of fame. I think I'd prefer watching Kanye West make another self agrandizing comment on t.v. rather than watch another clip of the sea sheperds talk tough and crash another sexy boat into the bow of another ship.

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When you use a ship such as Ady Gil in the way that she was on her last voyage I don't call it bravely fighting for whales, I call it willful stupidity.

"Willful stupidity"? I'd call it plain stupidity since they have clearly shown that they are stupid and dumb as f*ck.

Sea Shepherd whines about the Japanese and claim that they deliberately ram their ship but you clearly see on Whale Wars that the people of Sea Shepherd deliberately steer their ships across the bows of the Japanese ships and actually putting themselves in a position of being rammed by the Japanese vessels who have no intention of slowing down. That is pretty much the same as driving in Russia and you have to yield to the cars on the street crossing you and you just drive on thinking that the drivers traveling down the other street will surely stop for you when you do that.

So why should we believe that what Sea Shepherd claims about the Japanese deliberately ramming them to be true? Oh sure it is going to be seen on Whale Wars but that is a program and programs are edited so what will be shown there will only be the ships colliding but you will see nothing of the events taking place before it or you will see stuff from events that in reality have nothing to do with the incident and may even be stuff from weeks earlier.

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I think I'd prefer watching Kanye West make another self agrandizing comment on t.v. rather than watch another clip of the sea sheperds talk tough and crash another sexy boat into the bow of another ship.

If I had to chose between the two, I would go for option #3: "Turn off the TV".

... and to me it would be "another hideous looking boat into the bow of another sexy ship."

*goes off to expand Wesworld Japan's whaling fleet*


... looking at Wesworld, do you think that the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling has taken place here? According to wiki:

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It was signed by 15 nations in Washington, D.C. on 2 December 1946[3] and took effect on 10 November 1948. Its protocol (which represented the first substantial revision of the convention and extended the definition of a "whale-catcher" to include helicopters as well as ships) was signed in Washington on 19 November 1956.

... so we are in the right time frame for that...

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... looking at Wesworld, do you think that the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling has taken place here?

Given the rather quiescent nature of the board at the moment, I do not think assuming that the convention has taken place would be proper. Opening discussions on the matter would seem reasonable though. While Yugoslavia has no dog in the hunt, Germany is, and the Philippines has the means, to be a whaling nation.

(Of course, if anyone wants to buy those whale-catcher/naval auxiliaries off of me, let's dicker... :P )

I wouldn't automatically presume that the Convention has been set up, either - but like Bruce, I'd think that having a quick discussion on the matter would be logical. I'd need to skim the text before just agreeing to it, though.

Yes, I said it wrong. I should have said something like "do you guys think any of the Wesworld nations would be looking at something similar to the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling" rather than saying something that assumes that it has taken place.

Bruce, I would think that because the Philippines has those whale-catcher/naval auxiliaries it is a whaling nation, not just a nation that has the means to be a whaling nation.

I think Wesworld Japan is more worried about the well-being of all those poor defenseless sharks being hunted by those evil Chinese fishermen for their fins in a soup...

I could see the same discussions on whale hunting taking place in wesworld as historical or slightly later.

Yes, I think it would be entirely reasonable for such discussions to take place now in game time.
I can think of no reasons why not. I remember reading an article on the Dutch efforts to get into the whaling scene after WW2 and the rather lacklustre results they achieved.