No Ship at Avoca

The Australian Government has decided to RECYCLE the 2 obsolete warships HMAS Manoora and HMAS Kanimbla - finally Australia acts to dispose of their obsolete warships in a responsible manner.

This is HMAS Kanimbla, an 11 000 tonne warship which the government were trying to dump in beautiful Jervis Bay, then the Gold Coast but it will now be recycled along with the 8 500 tonne HMAS Manoora.

While it is too late for Avoca Beach this campaign successfully helped raise awareness of the toxic items (lead/PCBs/plastics) being dumped in our precious oceans, the waste of thousands of taxpayer dollars and tonnes of precious resources such as steel and aluminium, significant liability issues for public authorities responsible for the sea dumping and the hidden costs to the local marine environment where these ships are dumped.
Our oceans are not a dump for military waste!

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/dive-wreck-hopes-sunk-as-ships-head-to-scrapyard/story-e6freuy9-1226546770740

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/navy-workhorses-hmas-manoora-and-hmas-kanimbla-to-end-careers-as-scrap/story-fncynkc6-1226546722433

The sun has set on sea dumping
The tide has turned to recycling

(click image to view larger - NB this image was created by a friend of NSAG last year in Photoshop. We didn’t use it in the campaign partly as we thought the ship looked unrealistically too close and we did not want to give false representation of the sinking - sadly  on the day this is almost exactly what it looked like with the surfers right there. See other media photos showing close proximity to the beach here

Our government spent in excess of $8.3 million on this extreme act of environmental vandalism and reckless waste of precious resources.

They also spent $1 million fighting a small community group that exposed the ship did not comply with cleanup guidelines at the time they wanted to dump it in March 2010. 

The No Ship Action Group also exposed for the first time in Australia the misinformation and false economy of sea dumping ex military vessels at sea.

They have the beautiful and pristine waters of Jervis Bay as their next target. Avoca Beach could not be saved in time but hopefully this can be stopped before it is too late.

Jobs and Dollars Overboard - the economic case against dumping U.S. naval vessels at sea. Report by the Basel Action Network Dec 2010.

Dolphins nearly scuttle the scuttling
Courtesy Adrian Brightmoore
What Happened at Avoca Beach?

That Sinking Feeling At Avoca
The Fitz Files
p2 The Sun Herald 3-4-2011

(please click on image to view larger)