MEDIA RELEASE FROM NO SHIP ACTION GROUP 16/03/2010

WORLD class surfer Adrian “Ace” Buchan helps educate Minister for Planning and Lands Tony Kelly after Stateline aired on ABC television on Friday March 12.

Minister Kelly plans to dump a 4000 tonne warship 1700 metres off Avoca Beach, and 1400 metres off North Avoca. But when it came to the facts he was all at sea.

On Stateline Mr Kelly said: “The site … it’s on a sea bed that has rock underneath it so it will ensure that the boat will sit safely on the seabed. It’s also an area where there’s not great rips and wave activity. So that the report indicates there will be no adverse affect on waves or on sand drift.”

How little Mr Kelly knows about his own plans.

No Ship Action Group (NSAG) spoke to Mr Buchan while he competed in Perth on Monday (March 15). Mr Buchan, who was born at Avoca Beach and learnt to surf there, shed some light on the scuttling location for the Minister.

“[There’s] definitely wave action out there [where the buoy is],” Mr Buchan said.

“[There’s] big swells and turbulence under there[the buoy]. In a big swell that ship is 
sitting on the biggest sand deposit of the bay and it’s going to potentially interfere with natural sand flow caused by huge currents in big swells."
 
"I am worried about the effect the ship will have on movement of sand for two reasons. The natural formations of sandbars for surfers as it occurs naturally now, and the possible negative impacts on beach erosion.”

The scuttling site was chosen precisely because it has enough sand for the vessel to embed in (at least two metres) and is therefore not on rock.

On Stateline Mr Kelly stumbled over facts about PCBs, paint and community consultation but his crowning glory was the “environmental ship’’ halo he tried to bestow upon the former warship.

The No Ship Action Group (NSAG) hereby issues a formal invitation to the Minister to spend some time at Avoca Beach to learn how the sea works.

President of Avoca Beach Boardriders Inc, Anthony “Lovey” Love, said he would be happy to paddle the Minister out to the yellow buoy for close-up observation of how the currents worked in Bulbararing Bay.

Boardriders President Mr Love said: “You have only got to come down there when there’s a15 or 20 foot swell and there’s heaps of sand moving all round the bay. It’s not often, maybe twice a year, the real big swells are15 to 20 foot.”
     

WATCH FLYING ACE ADRIAN BUCHAN talking about growing up at Avoca on YOUTUBE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssJ8bg3pl2A   

WATCH ADRIAN BUCHAN GO UP AGAINST KELLY SLATER AND WIN QUIK PRO FRANCE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3778a-RSJzA