A breezy day yesterday but now the wind has gone but it's raining instead. I had hoped to escape the Napoli story as there are so many other things to write about but I seem to be on some sort of treadmill regarding the Napoli saga at the moment!
Let's report the good news first. There is a mandatory 500 metre exclusion zone around the stranded ship so it is difficult to know just how bad any pollution is under the sea immediately surrounding Napoli. However earlier this week there was some remarkable underwater TV footage taken just outside the aforementioned area that showed that particular bit of environment in near pristine condition. The rare corals and pink sea fans I am pleased to say are surviving very well. I understand that pink sea fans are rare and that our south west waters are a stronghold for them. More about this story can be seen here.
Not so good news is that ten or so containers have been washed off the wreck and that 7 have come ashore in rather inaccessible areas of the coast between Sidmouth and Branscombe; the risk of pollution though is thought to be minimal. The authorities do seem to have the situation well under control and I think anyone considering scavenging will be very disappointed.
My understanding is that the insurers are going to pay for all the considerable follow on costs of dealing with the Napoli. I certainly hope so as the presence of police and other officials over a long period of time will otherwise be a massive cost to the hard pressed council tax payers of Devon.
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Update on the above post. I have just heard the Maritime and Coastguard Agency say that out of the 10 containers washed overboard in the last 24 hours 8 have come ashore and the other 2 have sunk in known locations and are recoverable. There is a light sheen on the surface of the water around Napoli but we are are assured that this is not a particular pollution problem.
This is the thing about the containers I don't understand. I would have thought the firt thing that would have been done was to have people swarming all over it with steel ropes or appropriate to secure the contianers until as such time as they could have been lifted off. Again it is just luck as far as a I am aware they still haven't had to deal with a proper storm.
thanks for the bird flu link. Unfortunately I haven't been able to open it. It just gives me 404 or equivalent error-page not found.
Think you were on the right track with todays news that the contamination may have spread from thr processing plant to the Turkey sheds.
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