Cr Bill Faulkner Faulkners Corner www.sunlive.co.nz

Left hand down a bit early (on the helm) and bizzo, Rena hits Astrolabe Reef at more than 17 knots.

The city council along with regional council and Western Bay council has been fully involved with the consequences of the ship Rena, wrecked on Astrolabe Reef some 13.5 miles North East of the harbour entrance and four miles north of Motiti Island.

Astrolabe is named for the French corvette L'astrolabe under D'urmont Durville who also hit it in the 1830s. He didn't have a chart or GPS.

As would be expected, everyone has an opinion and there are many justified and some unjustified views on the incident. It has turned into a catastrophe as far as leaking oil onto our pristine beaches, coastline and harbour. Wildlife is inevitably suffering.

The bunker oil which fuels the main engines is a thick tar-like substance that gets heated before it is burned by the engines. Reportedly, 1700 tonnes of it. There is also about 200 tonnes of diesel which power the generators which supply electricity to the ship. Waterfront scuttlebutt, not to be relied upon, is an interesting potpourri – and there could be truths in there somewhere and they are noted because some conjure up interesting scenarios:

Allegedly, Rena has only $12 million insurance, for what, unknown; Rena didn't send an initial ‘mayday' when she hit the reef. The pilot boat went out to meet her with the pilot at the scheduled time – but no Rena; An unsourced informant has it that Rena had been warned she was off course beforehand; Rena might have suffered loss of power (electricity); Rena has no auto pilot; It was the captain's 44th birthday the day Rena hit the reef.

Need for resources

I visited the scene soon after and she certainly walloped the reef head on – reportedly at more than 17 knots (35km/h). At 47,000 tonnes, that's no mean impact. Light oil was coming out.

At this early stage it was apparent, even to me, that if urgent action wasn't taken that when the weather cracked up we were in for a catastrophe. At time of writing, weather had turned to strong North East, 4-5 metre swells, heavy bunker oil on our pristine beaches, 70 containers broken off and in the sea.

From an anonymous source I was told there was a caricature of a ships captain with a hangman's noose put up on the bridge of Rena. The captain has been arrested now the crew has been brought ashore. The second officer has also been charged. Not only were maritime authorities ill prepared and slow in recognising the potential for catastrophe, but so is the country. We just aren't big enough nor close enough to other countries to have the proper gear required on-hand for the quick response this situation required.

The forces are now being mustered and a lot of gear has to come from overseas. Apparently the bunker barge Awanuia already had fuel aboard and the navy oil tanker Endeavour had a fault, but in any event was being prepared, at great expense, to ship fresh water to Tuvalau, which is desperately short of drinking water.

Setting up a response

Oil booms have a very limited effect in choppy water – the oil ‘patties' just roll under the boom with the waves. On Tuesday, six days later, Rena had finally sent out a Mayday. My understanding of this action is that life is endangered. A ‘Pan' call is the lesser call for assistance. The onshore HQ overseeing this disaster is the old Foodtown supermarket and seems to have as many people in it as it did as a supermarket. Every man and his dog seems to be there complete with security fencing, security, papered up windows, traffic cones (inside) and police hazard tape (inside), sign in, badges issued and ID required. Thank heavens for this PC bureaucracy and our safety and health. Imagine if it was a war zone.

More issues for the city

Of equal or more importance to 384 Greerton homeowners is the unwelcome news that their homes are at risk of flooding in an extreme storm event like that which hit Otumoetai in 2005. With sophisticated computer analysis (so we were told) staff have identified the old overland flood paths around the city. Once verified, council is required to place the information on council files. This information is then publicly available on a LIM (Land Information Memorandum).

There is more bad news coming to other parts of the city as the programme continues. Letters went out this week and I was unhappy at what I perceived as the cold bureaucratic way the news was delivered, however, my colleagues said there was no other way to deliver bad news. Council is in a no win position. I agree, as the law requires council to make information public, but I would have written it in a more sympathetic and user-friendly way.

By the way, it was the old Tauranga County, Tauranga Borough and Tauranga City Council (before it became the Tauranga District Council and then Tauranga City again) that allowed the original subdivision and consequent suburban infill. Forgive them, some might say, they know not what they did.

In other news

Council got a glowing report from Audit NZ on its handling of the city's finances and annual plan for the last financial year. Why isn't it surprising that no one from the daily media, bar one, was present to report the good news?

I note the allowance as a late item in the report of $3.5 million for potential leaky homes liability. How this will be funded is not decided finally, but no matter which way it goes, sadly its only ratepayers who will bear the burden.

Police Area Commander Mike Clements reported an overall decrease of 8.8 per cent in Western Bay crime. I had noticed strong police presence on the road over the Kaimais and he told us that this has resulted in a 56 per cent decrease in ‘road trauma'.

K Valley presentation showed the remarkable achievements of the volunteer groups through the Rotary Clubs. About $600,000 and 150,000 trees and shrubs have provided an absolute transformation to this former gorse, blackberry and other noxious plant area. It's a 300 hectare park in the city centre and has a walkway to get to parts of it. Another great success story and thank you to Rotary.

Let's Get Growing, an organisation overseeing vegetable gardening on public land, gave a presentation. The Matua garden is an absolute credit to its participants. Proposals were floated for Welcome Bay gardens and at the Mount. Some elected members expressed disquiet at the prospect of May Street reserve being used to grow vegetables. This one will be a hot potato. May Street reserve residents were present in force – no doubt to cultivate their interests in its future. Some members were of the view that vegetable gardens were for land in no other use, not reserves.

Mount Hot Saltwater Pools are no longer drawing salt water from Pilot Bay due to the oil patties now entering the harbour. The water will be pristine membrane filtered fresh water with salt added. No kidding.

Big changes at TCAL who run the Aquatic Network. Chairman Warren Banks and fellow director Mike King have both resigned. It had been Warren's view that the development of the Hot Pools Centre would have generated extra revenue to make the Aquatics Network ratepayer subsidy neutral – at least as far as operational expense of some $700,000 was concerned.

In the event that this project was cancelled, Warren felt that there was no point in continuing. Certainly council desperately needs to generate alternative revenue streams. Thanks to both Warren and Mike who had done sterling work including the potential debacle that could have ensued when Leisure Co collapsed a couple of years ago.

This week's mindbender: When it is a question of money everyone is of the same religion – Voltaire.