DFO contractor not guilty of disturbing Luna

Judith Lavoie
Times Colonist

Thursday, July 14, 2005

A man accused of whale-whacking has been found not guilty.

Guy Chaisson, 63, of Powell River, a contract worker with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, was charged with contravening marine-mammal regulations and the federal Fisheries Act by unlawfully disturbing a killer whale.

Witnesses near the Gold River dock in July 2003 alleged that Chaisson, while trying to moor his boat, had hit or poked Luna the lonely orca with a stick. The whale, now five years old, has been in Nootka Sound since 2001.

However, provincial court Judge Brian Klaver accepted Chaisson's explanation that he was trying to disentangle Luna from the tow rope running between his nine-metre boat and a Zodiac.

Chaisson's lawyer, Ron Lamperson, said his client was coming ashore in Gold River and attempting to pull in the 46-metre line attached to the Zodiac when Luna began playing with the rope and pushing the Zodiac with his nose.

A loop of rope got caught around the whale and Chaisson used an alder walking stick to try and remove it.

Luna submerged and resurfaced without the rope, but the orca followed the boat into the dock and Chaisson used the stick to stop him getting entangled again, Lamperson said.

Witnesses at the old mill dock saw a person they thought was stabbing down with a pole and hitting the whale, he said.

"They thought it was an angry man, swearing at the whale and trying to jab him with a stick, but my client says he was just trying to get the rope off the whale," Lamperson said.

"My client is pleased the case is over, but he's still concerned about the well- being of the whale," he said.

Marc Pakenham of Marine Mammal Monitoring said he is concerned about Luna's safety. "It's a fact that some people find nature quite inconvenient," he said.

"I think there has been a tendency to characterize Luna as a dangerous whale, but we have nothing to substantiate that. It's more that people are behaving inappropriately with Luna."

There is every sign that Luna is an intelligent animal dealing well with intrusive human behaviour, Pakenham said.

"That's especially true when you consider that, in an ideal world, these creatures have about the same lifespan as human beings and this is just a baby."

An effort by DFO last summer to reunite Luna with his family pod was thwarted after members of the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation, who believe Luna embodies the spirit of their dead chief, lured him away.

Meanwhile, as the Nootka Sound boating season gets underway, a stewardship agreement between DFO and the Mowachaht/Muchalaht remains unfunded, although the First Nation is working on the water and doing dockside education.

The Mowachaht/Muchalaht estimate a full-time program, with a boat on the water 16 hours a day, seven days a week, would cost $177,000. The band wants DFO to pay some of the costs and is looking for other funding sources.

DFO fisheries manager Ed Lochbaum said a funding proposal has been submitted at a regional level.

Mowachaht/Muchalaht fisheries biologist Roger Dunlop said the band has not yet secured any funding.

"We are running in the red," he said.

Luna has been intercepted several times recently as he was heading toward stationary boats, he said, but Luna is not seeking out boats and people in the same way as he did previously.

"Just do not stop if you see the whale," he said