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Slick Discouragement

© Robin Greenhalgh

Last week in South Africa, just off the coast of Cape Town a bulk carrier sank. It's tankers contained iron ore and fuel oil which is now effecting the lives of the inhabitants for the second time in six years. The first being an oil spill known as the Apollo Sea Disaster which took and threatened the lives of many penguins in the area. Dassen Island is a nature sanctuary and is home to colonies of penguins, and again is in the headlines surrounding the recent oil spill which occurred last week. It's at times like these when our ignorance is like a slap in the face, and again the environment has to suffer from human impact.

I researched and read many top rated headlines regarding this issue and the only notable excuse I have come across for the accident, is that the hull was eroded with rust and/or deteriorated from age. Back in December 1998 the ten year phase-in regarding oil tankers and their improvement came to an end. This allowed them the time to upgrade older tanks to new corrosive resistant materials. Of course even if we allow for human error, old age and worn out hulls do not really fall under this heading. So where does that leave us?

Well, right at this precise moment it leaves us with approximately 56,000 birds to evacuate as well as needing approximately 900 volunteers to assist with feeding and oil removal from the birds. The "clean" birds have been relocated to an area about fourteen days swim away and it is hoped that by the time they complete their journey everything will be taken care of. It is all wonderful to hope that everything will have been cleaned up by this time but if not, then the birds will be returning to contaminated breeding and feeding grounds.

I am not here preaching perfection , if that were possible we wouldn't need to promote a sustainable environment to begin with. Although it does seem to me that the world's largest bird evacuation is currently happening and may have been preventable. It's a complicated concept to understand that man is both the destroyer and the salvation of all around us and that we are still a long way from living with nature efficiently.

Please take a moment and answer the following poll regarding your opinions on oil spill prevention.

Oil Spill Prevention
Which of the below fields do your believe is making more of an impact on oil spill prevention?

Back in 1994

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