State of Emergency Declared Around Galapagos Islands; Ship With Hazardous Materials Runs Aground

Ecosystem threatened

A state of emergency has been declared in the Galápagos Islands after a ship ran aground nearby last week.

The ship, called the Floreana, had been carrying food and other supplies - including some potentially polluting liquids and 45,000 litres (10,000 gallons) of fuel.

For now the ship remains in one piece, but officials are working to remove its fuel in case it splits and spills into the surrounding waters.

'Naufragio is a bay with great biological diversity,' Dr Carlos Valle, a professor at Universidad San Francisco de Quito, told the Wall Street Journal.

'There is a potential risk of its being affected, especially for very large colonies of sea lions and invertebrate species from the coast.'

Officials were keen to downplay the risk of danger to the surrounding area, saying that the 'greatest danger has passed.'

Nonetheless, they are still in the process of removing all the fuel from the ship, with about 12 per cent still left on board.

Ecuador declared the state of emergency on Wedesnday(sic), and the alert 'will allow authorities to have immediate (financial) means to deal with the situation,' a Galapagos National Park spokesman told AFP.

I certainly hope they can get everything off without damaging that ecosystem too much. Why they were near it is beyond me. That's just me though. Some days it seems like he just destroy everything we touch. I hope they follow up on this story.

WHAT WAS ON BOARD THE SHIP?
- 10,000 gallons of fuel
- 11 tons of gear oil
- 103 gas cylinders
- 48 tons of asphalt emulsion
Total: 1,925 tons of cargo
Source: Galapagos Digital

a reply to: Anyafaj

Oh that cannot be good....the need for money and profit will kill us all one of these days...the question is ..will we learn in time ?

a reply to: Anyafaj

I feel ya man or woman. Sometimes it seems like we actually go out of our way to cause more trouble for ourselves. I really hope they can fix this mess without it infecting that location. That's one of the only places left on the planet that hasn't been dramatically altered by our industrial "progress" and once it's gone we won't get it back.

People really suck sometimes. I also wonder why they were even close to there at all. I would hope we'd be smart enough to avoid going near there for anything other than scientific study of one of our last truly natural places left on earth.

originally posted by: hopenotfeariswhatweneed
a reply to: Anyafaj

Oh that cannot be good....the need for money and profit will kill us all one of these days...the question is ..will we learn in time ?

Sadly I doubt that.

originally posted by: mOjOm
a reply to: Anyafaj

I feel ya man or woman. Sometimes it seems like we actually go out of our way to cause more trouble for ourselves. I really hope they can fix this mess without it infecting that location. That's one of the only places left on the planet that hasn't been dramatically altered by our industrial "progress" and once it's gone we won't get it back.

People really suck sometimes. I also wonder why they were even close to there at all. I would hope we'd be smart enough to avoid going near there for anything other than scientific study of one of our last truly natural places left on earth.

*Woman, Anya is Hungarian for mother.

Yeah, we suck. I can see us going there for study, but seriously a stinking freighter? WT-Hey! No excuse. Just none. You cannot tell me in that VAST ocean, there wasn't another path for them to go. Ugh!

eheheh "Naufragio" is an italian word and it means "shipwreck"
Nominative determinism much?

Oh no - I really hope that nothing too bad happens.
This could be a complete disaster.

a reply to: Anyafaj

Another disaster at Sea and one which could have harmful consequences for the ECO system on those Islands!

Sometimes it seems there are people out there causing disasters on purpose. Their motive? To eventually destroy us.

My heart plummeted when I saw this headline. It's so awful.

I hope they can get it away from there without spilling out any of its fuel or other contaminants. From your article, this is the third ship this has happened to in the last year. At that rate, seems like only a matter of time before we completely destroy that area.

Humans disgust me more each day. We destroy everything eventually. So very sad.

originally posted by: MojaveBurning
My heart plummeted when I saw this headline.

It's so awful.

I hope they can get it away from there without spilling out any of its fuel or other contaminants. From your article, this is the third ship this has happened to in the last year. At that rate, seems like only a matter of time before we completely destroy that area.

Humans disgust me more each day. We destroy everything eventually. So very sad.

At the rate things are going, the wonderful ecosystem that we know there, will no longer exist and we will only have ourselves to blame. We are finding new plants and animals every day in rain forests, and then we cut it down.

Once again, humans ftw.


And I don't mean "for the win"