At Sea, SouthEastern Tuamotus 10 June 2010 21.2512S 137.4749W
Wishing away the sloppy seas, meant wishing away the wind. We’re now nearly becalmed, sailing at a breakneck speed of 1-2 knots. I realize to the mathematicians amongst you that 1-2 is a significant range, 2 being double the speed of one, but that significance is lost on me right now. As we get closer to our goal, our ETA still seems to stay at 3-4 days even though we’ve now been at it for over 2 days – a familiar feeling for a project manager!
Marc requested that I go into more detail about the atoll Mururoa which is no longer on our track, but is well west of us now (whew). It’s a potentially hot topic, and given my own anti-conflict stance, I hesitate, but it’s probably worth stirring the pot a bit.
I’m sure there is better background information on the web, but a quick summary: Mururoa and Fangataufa are two atolls very near us now, where the French did their nuclear weapons testing. French military activity in FP, has been driven primarily by this activity, and since the last test (late 1990s? check the Google for me), France has pretty much removed all military presence here, except a few guardians, to keep people away from these two hotspots. To the locals, the downside is that the military brought a huge influx of cash to their economy, which created a very big bureaucracy machine of government funded jobs for Polynesians. As the military pull out of certain communities, the collapse back to farming Copra has been a brutal drop for many. The upside is that whether or not FP declares independence from France, they will always have income from the leasing of these two atolls. By “always” I flash on the image of a guardian of the atolls 1000 years, or 100,000 years from now still paid for by France. Fantasy/scifi novel material for sure, imagine 100,000 years from now, a specially trained gatekeeper keeping guard, he learned the task from his father and his father’s father before him, but no one is sure anymore what they are keeping guard of, so they eliminate that line item from their budget and some future evil begins to harvest this rare healthy atoll, opening a pandoras box in paradise, and world destruction ensues. What a plotline. Or maybe by then global warming will have risen water levels faster than reefs can grow, and it will all be underwater. I wonder if they still have to pay the lease, if the island no longer exists.
As most of you know, this is a sail down memory lane for Frank, but you may not know that he is one of the few people on the planet who has actually visited Mururoa. Not all of his navigation in these waters was on fishing boats. He had an amazing introduction to FP, on a cruise arranged by the French goverment, in the form of his military service aboard the “Blavet” (originally given to France by us at the end of WWII). The noble Blavet, spent it’s last pre-retirement years here in French Polynesia, basically as a supply ship to military bases in the area. Frank had the dubious good fortune, of visiting many of the islands and atolls in French Polynesian waters aboard the “Blavet” until at the end of his year of service, she was decommissioned (some would say having him aboard, was the last nail in her coffin). Many of Franks stories the past couple weeks have been, “that’s where I broke my toe playing soccer with a coconut” “That’s where the ship blew it’s horn in the morning, to try to get us to come back from a long night of partying”, “I didn’t get to visit that island, because they wouldn’t let us ashore for awhile,” “that’s where the Marquaian, angry at not being allowed to visit his village “accidentally” rolled the launch with the captain the administrator and his wife in their whitey whites on an official visit to the Mayor.” The good news is, the kids look at him like he’s crazy, so I’m not too worried they’ll follow in his mischievous footsteps.
But his stories of Mururoa, are different, he didn’t goof off there – well except for one snorkeling event, normally not allowed, but there’s always a valid excuse to dive a boat, and the reef was just a short swim from there. He says he’s never seen such amazingly large fish, shells, sealife on a reef in FP. Apparently nuclear testing has done for the marinelife here, what Camp Pendelton has done for preserving a section of California Coast. Being untouched by humans (other than a periodic earthquake like jolt once in awhile) has resulted in prolific sealife unmatched at any of the other overfished atolls. The testing at Mururoa all occurred miles below the sea surface deep in the basalt, there is reportedly no radioactive leakage (this is one area of conflict, some claim that independent testing was not allowed, and that there’s likely a cover up etc.), but other than a cracks in the reef from the shake which do not extend deep into the basalt there was supposedly little damage to the atoll (reefs crack and break from external swells and big weather as well). The second atoll Fangataufa is different, no one goes there, and there is radioactive material from early surface tests.
There is some irony, given all the valid concerns about the impact of nuclear on the environment, that on the surface anyway, human impact has been more devastating to these atolls. Atolls are cleared and burned of many of their indigenous plants for the planting of Coconut trees. These same native plants grow bushier at the edges and would provide better protection from hurricanes if they were left as a break in front of the coconut groves. Even with the threat of ciguatera (potentially fatal nerve disease from toxic reef fish – toxins that arise when reefs are messed with by people or hurricanes), overfishing is still rampant. Excessive pearl farming is creating new problems in the balance of ecosystems, the list goes on.
It’s difficult as an American to be openly critical, without first looking at home. Compared to our own tests and arsenal, France’s nuclear weapons program is tiny, as were the tests themselves. I wonder if we pay Nevada for some kind of eternity guardianship? Debating the complexities of this topic would be much better over dinner and a bottle of wine.
A long post, flat calm, and we’re still quickly going nowhere. Time flies when you’re having fun. Thanks for giving me something to do on this dog watch.
xoxomo