Sometimes the green guys can't always win.
An ambitious 5,000 mile carbon-neutral sailing trip took a turn for the worst when stormy weather rendered the 40 ft. sailing boat disabled.
The boat, Fleur, was on a long journey from Plymouth, England to Greenland, where the two crew members would reach Greenland, ski across the ice cap and back to the boat, all with minimal environmental impact. The boat would be powered through solar panels and of course, wind. The intention of the trip was to show that some of the most extreme trips could be taken and remote areas explored in such a manner that only required environmentally-friendly technologies to get there.
Great. Except that within the first month of travel, everything went wrong. An intense storm capsized the boat, destroyed the solar panels and sailing capabilities of the boat. Oops. Luckily, the ocean is so awash (pun completely intended) with ships that they were very quickly rescued. They may have been thankful and happy to be alive, but the adventurers may not have been as excited to find out that their rescuer was a massive oil tanker carrying nearly 700,000 barrels of crude oil.
Nobody says it better than Alanis: Isn't it ironic?
Green is good, but it isn't perfect.
It seems like there will always be trade-offs with this so called green movement. These adventurers experienced a calamitous journey with the intention of being environmentally friendly. So they experience a bit of adversity and find themselves being rescued by an oil tanker.
ReplyDeleteI find that really humorous and quite tragic as well. Good for them for this positive endeavour; let's hope they don't have aspirations do join the oil sector to express their gratitude.