Sunday, October 9, 2011

New Zealand Crew Racing to Stop Oil Spill

The MV Rena container ship is stranded on a reef in the Bay of Plenty off New Zealand leaking oil into the ocean. So far, 20-30 tons of oil have been leaked and New Zealand crews are racing to extract as much of the oil from the ship as possible. Gale-force winds and swells are in the forecast and if the weather breaks up the ship, as much as 1,700 tonnes of oil could be released into the area. The Bay of Plenty is one of the countries top tourist destinations and is filled with wildlife such as birds, whales, dolphins and little blue penguins. They have already collected 8 which were covered in the oil and had ingested some of it, causing them to become anemic. About 200 people are working in response to this accident and New Zealand's defense force has about 300 additional people on hand. Hopefully, they can extract all the oil from the container before the weather gets out of hand and save the future of the reef and wildlife. Also, I do hope the next fleets they send out are a little bigger to carry more oil away.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-15235243

By Carmen Brodnax

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