Shawn Clarkson
Tauranga, New Zealand
The volunteer clean up centre at Papamoa Beach. Photo courtesy Shawn Clarkson
The Bay of Plenty is on the East coast of the North Island in New Zealand. Tauranga is in the middle of this area and is an amazing, beautiful place to live, with miles of white sandy beaches. We have lots of people who come here for the holidays because the climate is so good, as well as for the beaches and fishing.
A couple of weeks ago, a huge container ship, the MV Rena, ran aground on the Astrolabe reef about 7km north of Motiti Island, off the Tauranga coast. A lot of oil has leaked out onto beaches and into the sea.
Email and Text Alerts
We have heard a lot about what is happening with the oil cleanup and get emails and texts to let us know when they need volunteers to help. Everybody in the area is trying to do their bit, and help when they can, to clean up the beaches and to keep them clean. This is hard because it just keeps coming. All these volunteers have to wear protective overalls, gloves and covers over their boots because the oil, and the stuff they spray on it to break it up, is toxic and the organizers don’t want oil spreading to other areas.
I guess everyone is just so upset by what is happening that they don’t want to sit around doing nothing, so over 4000 people have volunteered so far. Some of them are visitors who are here to watch the Rugby World Cup.
A lot of my friends have volunteered as well, so one day we all went down together to clear up a beach in Kulim Park, which is actually inside the harbour area and the oil has even reached there. At that clean up point, there were about 20 of us so we got everything cleaned in about an hour. The sad thing is that it will have to be cleaned up again when the wind changes and more oil is swept that way.
The cleanup at Kulim Park had oil that looked like the tar on our roads. It was in big cakes on top of, and just under the sand. It felt like black chewing gum and was very, very sticky. It smelled like a mechanics workshop, like the smell when you open a car engine. It was dotted along the whole beach in amongst the rocks and sand. It was difficult to get off the rocks because it was stuck so hard. It was easier to get out of the sand as it simply peeled off like dough. There was also some oil on the water that was so thick we could run our hands through it to pick it up.
The Devastation
Clean up guys with the crane ship in the distance to try and get some containers of the Rena. Photo courtesy Shawn Clarkson
I am gutted about what has happened to our beautiful beaches and to our wildlife. It is pretty sad to see the effects of what the oil has done to the wildlife, especially the birds. Hundreds of birds have died from being covered in this oil, but more volunteers have set up cleaning stations to try to rescue as many as possible.
I am pretty angry with the captain of the ship that allowed this to happen and now we have to clean up all the mess. Our city is a big tourist spot, so lots of businesses are losing money because people don’t want to come to the beaches anymore.
I guess it has changed how I think about the way we use oil and how it should be transported, especially at sea as it has a major effect on or lives. I am sure there are better ways of doing things if people thought about it and were open to other ideas.
I am hoping that they can speed up the process of getting the oil off the Rena before she sinks. There is no way they are going to be able to get it the ship back to shore without it breaking up or sinking. The next best thing, once the oil and containers are off, would probably be to sink it and make an artificial reef. This would bring in more divers and provide habitat for small fish and then of course, for the larger ones, which would make the fishermen very happy.
Shawn Clarkson is 17 years old and in his final year at Bethlehem College. He lives in Tauranga in the Bay of Plenty, New Zealand.
