PORT ANGELES — Makah whalers met anti-whaling activists Thursday with surprising tolerance during the second scoping meeting concerning the tribe’s request to resume whaling.
There was one brief tiff that was quickly quelled.
Then participants settled down to quietly profess their opinions.
The single spat came before the session started and occurred between Chuck Owens of Joyce, co-founder of Peninsula Citizens for the Protection of Whales, and Dave Sones, vice chairman of the Makah Tribal Council.
Owens showed Sones a picture of the partially butchered whale the Makah killed in 1999.
Sones then pushed Owens away.
They were separated immediately.
During small group sessions that made up most of the 150-minute meeting, however, Owens sat shoulder to shoulder with Wayne Johnson, skipper of the Hummingbird canoe crew who harpooned the Makah’s last gray whale six years ago.
The two exchanged good-natured banter, although no one could mistake their separate sides.
One observer who had witnessed vehement anti-whaling protests six years ago called the pairing “surreal.”
Later, when one Native American woman and an anti-whaling activist traded charges of racism, their group’s moderator briskly stopped the quarrel.
100 attended meeting
About 100 people attended the National Marine Fisheries Service “scoping meeting” in the Vern Burton Community Center.
Attendance was equally split between Native Americans and non-Natives.
Participants listed what they want to include in an environmental impact statement on the tribe’s request to resume whaling.