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A British cruise line has apologized to passengers who witnessed the slaughter of nearly 80 pilot whales in the Faroe Islands on Sunday. Ambassador Cruise Line guests arrived to the port in the capital of Torshavn, where a traditional hunt had turned the sea red. Hunters used motorboats and a helicopter to corral the whales in a beach nearby before dragging them with hooks and butchering them with knives.
The cruise line quickly issued an apology to guests who were blindsided by the graphic nature of the hunt, or Grindadráp in Faroese.
“We were incredibly disappointed that this hunt occurred, particularly at a time when our ship was in port, and have offered our sincere apologies to all those onboard who may have witnessed this distressing occurrence,” the company said in a statement.
Though the carnage caught the cruise line by surprise when it pulled into Torshavn, the company had been aware of the annual event. In a 2021 letter to Faroe’s prime minister, chief executive Christian Verhounig expressed his dismay over a dolphin hunt that had occurred in September. That same year, the company teamed up with ORCA, a marine conservation group based in the United Kingdom, on an anti-whaling and dolphin hunt campaign.
Before the July sailing, the ORCA and Ambassador had tried to raise the issue with the Faroese government and Visit Faroe Islands, the tourism office. Their attempts failed. The cruise line also urges its guests and crew members to spurn the industry by not buying or eating whale or dolphin meat.
The tourism office did not respond to requests for comment from The Washington Post. Svein Magnason, the chief adviser in the Faroe Islands’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Culture, said in an email that tourism and whaling taking place side by side “does not cause concern for the government, although whale drives can be a dramatic sight for spectators unfamiliar with the slaughter of mammals.” The local government later published the same response in a statement on its website.
“While traditional hunts of this type have taken place for many years in the Faroe Islands to sustain local communities, we strongly object to this outdated practice, which we believe is now becoming commercial, with meats sold in local supermarkets,” the company stated.
For centuries, islanders living on the isolated archipelago in the North Atlantic had to rely on the sea for sustenance. Whaling was their livelihood and lifeline. Today, the country of about 53,000 residents boasts modern supermarkets and even a Burger King. However, Faroese still participate in the whale hunt, a community activity that can be traced as far back as 1584, when, according to government records, four pilot whales were killed. Images of a beach lined with pilot whales recalls the dolphin hunt in Taiji, Japan, depicted in the 2009 Oscar-winning documentary “The Cove.”
The meat and blubber is distributed among the islanders, one of the hunt’s defenses: It’s feeding the people. However, health experts warn that the cetaceans contain dangerous levels of mercury, heavy metals and pollutants. According to the United Kingdom branch of Whale and Dolphin Conservation, recent studies demonstrate a direct link between such diseases as Parkinson’s, hypertension and arteriosclerosis of the carotid arteries in Faroese adults and the consumption of pilot whale meat. Children and pregnant people are especially at high risk.
The “Grind” takes place over several months, roughly April to October, depending on the severity of the weather. Summer is often high season. “If you go to the Faroe Islands in July, what do you expect?” said John Hourston, founder of Blue Planet Society, a U.K.-based group dedicated to ending the hunt. “The [cruise line] should have known better.”
Long-finned pilot whales are one of the largest members of the dolphin family, second in size to the killer whale. The highly intelligent animals measure 19 to 25 feet long and can weigh up to 5,000 pounds, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. They have round, bulbous heads and upturned mouths that resemble a smile.
Visit Faroe Islands says on its website about 800 pilot whales are killed a year, a number the government claims is sustainable. Whale and Dolphin Conservation estimates the global pilot whale population is 800,000 to 1 million, and about 100,000 reside in Faroe’s waters. So far this year, the government has registered 646 whale killings, including the 78 on Sunday and 445 on June 14.
In addition to pilot whales, Hourston said, hunters target other small whales and dolphins, such as orcas, Atlantic white-sided dolphins and Northern bottlenose whales. In September 2021, participants killed more than 1,400 Atlantic white-sided dolphins, an alarming body count that forced the government to cap the number at 500. There is no such quota for the pilot whales, according to Whale and Dolphin Conservation. Over the past 20 years, the group said more than 20,000 marine mammals have perished in these hunts.
“It’s a blood sport. It’s no more than a summer pastime,” Hourston said. “Any small dolphin or small whale is fair game.”
The European Union bans the killing of whales and dolphins; however, the self-governing country under the Kingdom of Denmark is not a member of the organization. Government officials said its hunting techniques have improved over the years, though animal welfare groups disagree. The standard practice involves securing a hook in the blowhole, dragging the animal onto the beach, severing its spinal cord and blood supply, and cutting its neck with a whaling knife.
“It is barbaric and torture, and it’s done on such a large scale,” Hourston said. “Those people are going to need counseling after seeing that.”
In his 2021 letter to the prime minister, the Ambassador Cruise Line chief executive hinted that the company might cut the Faroes from its itineraries if the country didn’t address the cruelty of the hunt. In 2014, Disney eliminated the port from its schedule; a few European cruise lines, such as AIDA and Hapag-Lloyd, followed suit. This week, Ambassador explained its reasons for continuing to visit the country, despite its objections to the hunt.
“We don’t support the hunt by coming here,” the company stated. “We’ll always use it as an opportunity to remind the authorities that tourists want to marvel at the wildlife and not to watch it being killed.”
Nora Livingstone, chief executive and co-founder of Animal Experience International, a Canadian company that specializes in ethical animal travel, said tour operators should not steer travelers away from a country’s darker traditions or more disquieting customs. Exposure is a form of education and can be an essential agent of change.
“The whale hunt is extremely distressing to witness, but turning away doesn’t help the animals who are killed, and it doesn’t help give voice to those who take part in the hunt,” she said by email. “Shielding passengers only allows them to be ignorant to both the traditional culture of the place they are visiting and to the sentient beings who are being slaughtered.”