Thursday, January 14, 2010

Japanese whaler sinks activist ship Ady Gil

Ady Gil anti-whaling ship
The Ady Gil was a powerful trimaran originally designed to break the record of the shortest time to circumnavigate the globe. Although its two attempts did not achieve their goal, the ship remained a truly unique in its genre. High technology, speed and stealth made it the perfect match to complete the anti-whaling fleet of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society in tracking illegal Japanese whalers in the Australian and New Zealand Antarctic Territorial waters.

On January 6th, it made the news but unfortunately for a sad reason. While supervising one of the Japanese vessels, the MV Shōnan Maru 2, a collision occurred between the two ships. The $2 million 18 ton vessel did not survive the 500 ton whaling ship's hit and reportedly sunk the next day.

On the video below are shown 3 different angles of the collision. We clearly see that the Ady Gil crew was relaxing on the deck, far from expecting what was soon going to happen. When they realised the Japanese ship changed its course heading straight for them, time was too little to react, especially when you know that the boat had to maneuver forward, through the Japanese ship's collision course, in order to escape.

Monday, January 11, 2010

Five Recent & Must-See Documentaries

Many people would rather watch a good old Hollywood action movie on a Saturday night. But if you have some time to kill, there are many great documentaries out there that are definitely worth seeing. Advanced filming equipment and methods bring us never-seen-before quality footage making documentary films an entertaining way raising awareness on various issues. Here are several movie trailers that fall in the "must watch" category. If you like trailer, rent/buy the whole movie! Also, please spread the word by sharing this page with your friends and family!


Sharkwater
(2006)

Saturday, January 9, 2010

Deforestation amongst the "hidden" causes of global warming.

I came across this interesting news report on France24 regarding one of the "hidden" causes of global warming. Obviously we all knew deforestation was not a good thing, but the relation and impact of deforestation on climate change was slightly more subtle. According to the documentary, deforestation produce between 25 and 30% of the greenhouse gases released each year in the atmosphere. What's even more alarming, is that poor developing countries rely hugely on deforestation for many reasons: clearing fields for agriculture, producing and selling charcoal, etc. We need to help these countries develop sustainable yet growing economies. An example of what could be done is the result of SM Raju's project in India, that offers tree-planting jobs to thousands of families.

It is said that forests around the world disappear at a shocking rate of 2.4 acres, e-v-e-r-y single second. That's the equivalent of two football fields in size every second, or 172,800 footaball fields a day... What will happen when all major forests are gone?

 
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