Elissama de Oliveira Menezes and actress Q'orianka Kilcher securely attached to the anchor chain of the M/V Clipper Hope. Photo (c) Greenpeace

A bulk carrier scheduled to pick up a cargo of pig iron destined for the U.S. is stuck at anchor near Sao Luis, Brazil after Greenpeace protestors have attached themselves to the vessels anchor chain, preventing it from moving.

Greenpeace's new Rainbow Warrior staging vessel. Photo (c) Greenpeace

The 31,883 dwt bulk carrier M/V Clipper Hope was first boarded on May 14th when Elissama de Oliveira Menezes, a 20 year-old activist from Brazil, climbed onto the chain to protest the use of pig iron largely by U.S. automakers. New research, according to Greenpeace, shows how pig iron, which is used in the production of steel and is exported from Brazil ready for processing, is linked to helping destroy the Amazon rainforest and even contributing to slave labor in the region.

The protest was launched from Greenpeace’s new vessel, the Rainbow Warrior, which is in the Amazon on a two month tour to highlight the importance of protecting the rainforest, to expose who is responsible for its destruction and to champion the solutions needed to achieve the end of deforestation in Brazil.

Menezes was joined Monday by activist and actress Q’orianka Kilcher, known for her role as Pocahontas in Terence Malik’s 2006 Oscar nominated “The New World”.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Ms. Kim giving a victory wave from her crane.

Occupy Wall Street has grabbed the headlines but momentum is slowing and their message is falling on deaf ears in Washington. Maybe they would be more effective if they took lessons from the maritime world on how to conduct a  protest. And to that end gCaptain has found the perfect teacher; Ms. Kim a shipyard worker who’s fortitude is producing results in South Korea. :

A solo protest that lasts 309 days is rare but Kim Jin-suk did it atop a 115 foot high crane with no access to basic necessities like running water – and it finally ended on Thursday.

Ms. Kim, a labor activist and former employee at the Busan-based Hanjin Heavy, came down from the crane after union workers accepted an offer from the shipyard’s management to rehire 94 workers who were laid off last year. The workers will also receive some compensation.

Her protest attracted attention in and out of the country. Supporters portrayed her as a martyr of the unemployed and less privileged. Hanjin criticized her for sabotaging their operations by occupying the crane “illegally” since she had been fired from the company more than 20 years ago.

Labor leaders and politicians rallied to her cause, visiting the shipyard, and other labor groups staged “Bus of Hope” protests outside the shipyard, in which several thousand people were bused to Busan for rallies.

Ms. Kim kept in touch via cellphone, sending Twitter messages to more than 27,000 followers.

The saga started in December last year, when Hanjin workers walked out in protest against the planned layoff of 400 workers, and the company, in turn, closed the shipyard. On Jan. 6, Ms. Kim started her crane-top protest.

“I knew I would come down alive. I could endure this because of you and (fellow) unionists. You saved me,” she said when she climbed down on Thursday. She was then taken to a nearby hospital for medical check-up.

Before coming down, though, Ms. Kim told a radio station that she’s worried that Hanjin won’t carry out its promise to rehire the 94 workers.

Ms.Kim’s protest underscored a difficult reality for companies in Korea: it’s hard to fire people no matter how bad business is going. After the onset of the global economic crisis in 2008, Hanjin went for nearly three years without getting any new orders for ships. It reported a net loss of 51.7 billion won, or about $45 million, last year.

By John Konrad, gCaptain International and Jaeyeon Woo, Dow Jones Asia

Photo: Aerial view of Port of Oakland via Wiki Commons

OAKLAND, Calif.—The Occupy Oakland protesters’ call for a general strike Wednesday largely fizzled as organizers failed to rally significant support from unions, but protesters brought operations at the Port of Oakland to a halt.

Maritime operations at the port, one of the biggest container ports in the U.S., were “effectively shut down” on Wednesday by demonstrators, said port officials. They added they would resume work “when it is safe and secure to do so.”

Occupy Oakland, the West Coast’s most volatile branch of the Occupy Wall Street movement, said on its website that it was “asking all workers go on strike, call a vacation day or simply walk off the job.” Last week, demonstrators and police here clashed in violent skirmishes that caught international attention.

But relatively few workers headed the strike call Wednesday, raising questions about the breadth of the movement’s support.

Police estimated a crowd of about 3,000 had gathered at the Port of Oakland by about 5 p.m. local time, the Associated Press reported. Some had marched from the city’s downtown, while others had been bused to the port. Although Oakland Mayor Jean Quan gave permission to most city employees to observe the strike call if they wanted, spokeswoman Karen Boyd said few of the 4,000 workers did.

At Oakland Unified School District, about 360 teachers, or 18% of the 2,000 total, took the day off to observe the strike, said district spokesman Troy Flint. “We had to scramble to make sure substitutes were in every classroom, or redistributed students into other classrooms, but there were no disruptions,” he said.

About 40 Port of Oakland workers didn’t show up at the largest hiring hall for the 325 daily jobs, said Craig Merrilees, a spokesman for the International Longshore and Warehouse Union’s national headquarters in San Francisco. Port officials said they closed their administrative offices early as a precaution. Some marine terminals planned to close early as well.

Some protesters in the city broke windows of banks and businesses and spray-painted slogans on ATMs. Many stores near City Hall were shut. At the University of California headquarters, officials asked the approximately 1,300 employees to work from home in case of transit troubles.

Organized labor mostly participated in the strike call by showing moral support for the Occupy protesters, said Josie Camacho, executive secretary treasurer of the Alameda Labor Council, an umbrella group for local unions.

Union members handed out stickers supporting Occupy Oakland and planned a cook-out of hot dogs and hamburgers for the encampment in front of City Hall on Wednesday afternoon, labor officials said.

Occupy organizers and sympathizers, who included some union leaders ,said they considered Wednesday’s actions a success. “It’s a great day to get our message out about the Occupy Wall Street movement,” Ms. Camacho said. “There’s such a good energy—music, a lot of people gathering, people with their children. It’s exciting.”

Some protesters expressed disappointment. “Some of this stuff is silly,” said Audra Nemir, a 28-year-old freelance tutor, as about 2,000 protesters milled around in a festive atmosphere at City Hall early Wednesday. “A strike has more power than people camping out.”

(c) 2011 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

On March 24th 1999, ATC’s supertanker Marine Columbia entered Prince William sound to find the SeaLand SeaRiver vessels anchored far from port. The mate on watch was aware of the fact that Exxon renamed it’s fleet SeaRiver and he realized that it was the 10th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez but did not put the two facts together until the ship was secured alongside the dock when he got an unusual call from his AB on deck.

“Mate, request permission to drop the Starboard Anchor.” said the AB.

“WTF do you want to do that for?” replied the mate.

“Come up here and see for yourself!”

Upon arriving on the bow he was directed to the hawsepipe where he could plainly see Greenpeace protesters who had chained themselves to the anchor. Dropping the anchor was, of course, a joke. Rather than sending the activists on a quick trip to Davey Jone’s locker the police were called and they where removed the proper way, by a SWAT team with rappelling gear and bolt cutters. But it left a strong impression in everyone’s mind, what would have happened if the anchor slipped or if the AB had not been American but from a country less tolerant of such actions? For this reason Greenpeace developed a new device in their arsenal of anti-ship weapons; The Anchor Pod.

According to Greenpeace, no expense was spared in the building of the 2 meter wide, 1/2 ton yellow pod which they have “equipped with supplies to last for a month.The pod has everything you need, bathroom, kitchen, hospital … and housemates.” said Leila Deen, an activist who lived in the pod during it’s recent deployment against the drillship Stena Carron. The pod reportedly cost Greenpeace nearly $50,000 to construct and is made of “bullet proof” material (probably a carbon fiber or kevlar composite) although we question the survivability of the design.

Of curious note, at the time of the protest the Stena Carron, as this video shows, had both anchor’s hung off just above the water’s edge making it easy for the protester’s to gain access. If any of our readers have insight into why the anchors where hung off please add a comment below.

Looks the Hawaii Superferry is running into even more trouble with environmental opposition. The New York Times tells us:

Officials with the first passenger-vehicle ferry between major Hawaiian islands canceled plans to resume service to Kauai, despite a partial court victory and an announcement by Gov. Linda Lingle that the ferry would start up again next Wednesday.

Hawaii Superferry officials said late Friday that the decision was made “for the safety of the community, our passengers and our dedicated employees.”

The announcement came a day after more than 1,000 people jammed a public meeting on Kauai with Ms. Lingle, a Republican, who tried to sell the project to island residents. Opponents shouted her down, calling the Superferry a threat to the environment and the island’s rural charm. Read More…

Thanks to SeaFever for the Discoverer Tip.

Update:

Kauai Case Against the Hawaii Superferry Will Likely Be Dropped Thursday, But Appeal Expected