Using a yacht to catch a whale... No, seriously...
 

Just when you thought you'd seen it all, a whale decides to go yachting...

A breaching whale has crash-landed on a sailboat in Table Bay, narrowly missing the vessel's occupants and leaving in its wake bits of blubber and thick skin.

This picture shows the southern right whale seconds before its massive body landed on the coach roof of the boat, flattening the steel mast and bringing down the rigging before sliding back into the water and disappearing into the distance.

"It was quite scary," said Paloma Werner, who had been out sailing with her boyfriend and business partner, Ralph Mothes, of the Cape Town Sailing Academy.

"We thought the whale was going to go under the boat and come up on the other side. We thought it would see us."

Before:

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279697301.jpg

After:

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279697332.jpg

The news link seems to imply that the boat pissed the whale off. If so, good for the whale, but I hope it wasn't injured badly.

I used to get annoyed by a mullet or two jumping into our sailboat in FL. But a whale? WTF? :eek:

Mullets?? in my boat?? :D:D:D

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279712181.jpg


http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279712197.jpg

LOL. :D

http://graphics2.jsonline.com/graphi...fish122604.jpg

see the whales are still pissed about the "moby dick" debacle.

it's payback for pinging them with sonar.

That's why you live in Philly?

At least it's not Detroit..

im telling ya whales HATE "BLOW-BOTES" that would have NEVER happened with a "GO-FAST"!

wood mast on that boat [ not steel nobody uses a steel mast]

I wondered about that. Steel hull, but I assume aluminum mast.

Scary stuff.

Now if that had been one of those green peace boats?

My parents neighbor had whale(s) attack and sink their sailboat... never got the full story because the husband died and pretty sure the wife didn't want to talk about it.

But apparently it does happen.

I reiterate, the ocean is great!

I want to get a small sail boat.... I have no desire to get it in water with creatures that big however....

Some more "After" pics.

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279789759.jpg

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279789791.jpg

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279789912.jpg

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279790002.jpg

From pictures taken yesterday the whale seems to be doing just fine:

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279790025.jpg

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1279790050.jpg

Yup, he is having a WHALE of a good time :D. Hyuk hyuk!

They should quit blubbering and be thankful they're still alive.

Fin.

Looks like an insurance scam to me.