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Rescuers race to save 14k sheep on capsized cargo ship
- scandox 7y agoAn elderly German man told me a story. He was some kind of trade representative in Yemen, based in the Port city of Aden. New Zealand (I think) and Yemen had recently concluded a trade deal for live sheep. The first shipment was to be met with some minor fanfare and a horde of diplomats, trade delegates, minor politicians etc were massed at the docks watching the ship come in. He says that at a certain point there were a huge flock of sheep on the deck of the vessel and that they suddenly seemed to panic and started leaping into the water. As they did so, sharks in the water started attacking them. Everyone on the docks simply watched as the sheep kept flowing into a blood red sea. I wish I remembered the details more precisely, because the story certainly requires bolstering with credible detail. He was a well respected person from what I could make out, so I believed him - at the time anyway.
- toun 7y agoMaybe he was refering to Panurge's sheeps .. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panurge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panurge)
- growlist 7y agoLive shipping should be banned.
- dev_north_east 7y agoWhy?
- henryaj 7y agoBecause of the extraordinary suffering it causes to animals. https://www.ciwf.org.uk/our-campaigns/live-animal-transport/ https://www.ciwf.org.uk/our-campaigns/live-animal-transport/
- an_ko 7y agoI'm sure it would be possible to transport animals more gently. Banning live animal transport altogether sounds like an overreaction.
- toomanybeersies 7y agoYou can slaughter them first and ship the carcasses.
- frosted-flakes 7y agoWhat if you're trying to sell breeding animals?
- growlist 7y agoCome on now, that's the exceptional case here.
- pvaldes 7y agoThe same animals walking under the desert sun for months coated in wool without nothing green at sight, does not seem like a totally cruelty-free better alternative necessarily. There is not logical reason to see it as a morally superior alternative. There is bad ways and good ways to transport animals by road.
- henryaj 7y agoWhere did I suggest we should transport live animals thousands of miles by making them walk the whole way?
- pvaldes 7y agoOk. Honest question. What do you suggest then? Teleportation? The "but its cruelty against animals so lets kill them instead!" card is a random and really worn out argument nowadays. We have enough of real problems yet.
- ruthless_banker 7y agoHow is shipping different than truck or train.
- randomsearch 7y agoShipping can refer to all three in this context.
- toomanybeersies 7y agoGenerally the journeys are much longer and in poorer conditions, with a lot less oversight. Live shipping of sheep and beef out of Australia and New Zealand, especially to the Middle East, has been very controversial and banned on and off depending on the economy and political flavour of the month. It's a long, hot, hard journey, across the equator into the Middle East. There's no oversight on the ships, they get transported in horrible conditions, and the countries they're shipping the animals to don't have a great track record on animal cruelty. Here's a case where 2,400 sheep died from heat stress on a voyage from Australia the Middle East: https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jul/31/live-exporter-charged-with-sheep-cruelty-over-deadly-awassi-shipment https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jul/31/live-... That's not an isolated incident either. It's endemic to live shipping. The whole reason they're doing it is because they want to maximise profits by shipping them live and slaughtering them in countries where it's cheaper, rather than using Australian abattoirs and shipping frozen carcasses or cuts.
- bobongo 7y agoI had assumed OP meant all methods of shipment.
- Aeolun 7y agoWe’re shipping humans live. It’s not as if we subject sheep to something we aren’t willing to undertake ourselves.
- soonoutoftime 7y agoWhat are you talking about exactly? Are thousands of humans dying of heat stress due to spending weeks at sea in literally unbearable conditions? It's horrific.
- Aeolun 7y agoI'm talking about shipping sheep/animals by sea. The conditions of said shipping can sure use some improvement, but banning it altogether seems like an overreaction.
- MisterTea 7y agoCitation needed. Last time I tried to ship someone in a container I got 20 years.
- xvx 7y agoModern day slave ships. I’m sure the sheep are insured and it’s more profitable to leave them to drown.
- AndyMcConachie 7y agoProve it.
- kmlx 7y agowhat nonsense is this? what slave ship?
- andrewjrhill 7y agoAre you trolling or do you genuinely believe the trade and transport of livestock is the same as human slavery? The mind boggles.
- callesgg 7y agoloots of people attribute the same value to animals as they attribute to humans. A life, is a life. Also he did not say that they where the same, he implied they where comparable on some dimension.
- randomsearch 7y agoI’m undecided on this topic, but it’s an interesting test of imagination as to whether you could envisage animals before afforded the same rights as humans in the future. Certainly the direction of travel strengthens that proposition, and contemporary attitudes to slavery show just how wrong you can be simply by relying on the ethics in vogue during your lifetime.
- IceCreamGondola 7y agoWithout knowing the in's and out's of supply and demand this really raises the question as to why 14,000 sheep needed to be transported. Our reliance on global markets for our produce is out of hand (probably preaching to the converted here).
- kmlx 7y ago> why 14,000 sheep needed to be transported why not? if i sell my sheep and need to deliver them to the buyer, then i'll need a form of transport.
- netcan 7y agoThe pertinent question is "why live?" Live transports are (for example) the biggest animal welfare issue for kiwi sheep.
- Lev1a 7y agoBecause of religious BS.
- ruthless_banker 7y agoCareful, you are dangerously close to hate speech.
- zanybear 7y agoI'm assuming because of the way an animal is sacrificed in order to be considered "halal". It would require a large slaughterhouse with the proper setup, which in an 98% orthodox country is not a easy arrangement.
- toomanybeersies 7y agoAbout 25% of red meat exports from New Zealand are halal, and almost every slaughterhouse is capable of halal slaughter. It's actually not particularly difficult to do halal slaughter, the two main requirements are that it is killed with a cut to the throat (common in non-halal slaughter) by a Muslim.
- raducu 7y ago"It is not yet known what caused the ship, which was bound for Saudi Arabia, to capsize" The romanian newspapers initially reported that the sheep were simply not loaded on both sides of the ship.
- ht85 7y agoSheeping is hard
- toomanybeersies 7y agoThe front fell off: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m5qxZm_JqM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m5qxZm_JqM
- ddmma 7y agoSheeps on the ship. Terrible story. But it’s similar to liquid transportation not having proper organisation can unbalance the forces.