All Quiet on the Cleanup Front at Alameda Point
http://alamedasun.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2439&Itemid=10
SF Bay oil spill cleanup executive Tim Babcock is a clear-eyed man with that certain look of a
person in charge. But Tuesday, Nov. 20, at 9:50 a.m., his look was somewhat harried at the
Alameda Point oil-spill headquarters offices occupied by NRC Environmental Services at 1605
Ferry Point.
Senior Project Manager Babcock was in the position of saying no to an Alameda Sun request
for the latest information on the SF Bay oil spill cleanup following the collision of the container
ship Cosco Busan with a pier of the Bay Bridge Nov. 7.
Babcock regretted that he had "no time to grant an interview" and he apologized earnestly.
Outside, it was so quiet at the waterfront oil spill materials receiving dock that the situation
spoke for itself. Just a dozen or so yellow-clad workers kept busy at make-work tasks — laying
out plastic sheets and so forth on the dock. Some of them came from other NRC units as far
away as San Diego.
That Tuesday, in one spot they had neatly stacked oil-stained bright yellow floating "oil
booms," and in another spot a few bags of clear plastic oil waste at the end of a gangway
leading to a Dumpster sitting on the quay.
Down the road a few hundred feet, a small fleet of big rigs stood idle, their drivers grouped at
roadside as they waited to haul off Dumpsters, if and when. But there were no boats or barges
to be seen coming in with more oil-fouled cargo. Nearby, in a large restricted fenced area
where it is said that polluted oil materials are "processed," there were few sounds of activity.
The zone of Alameda Point adjacent to the former Naval Air Station is seldom buzzing with
obvious activity. Little ever seems to move or even alter in the overwhelming shadows of
enormous gray U.S. Navy vessels at grim piers.
Then out of nowhere a TV news helicopter zips in fast for a look, circles over the lackluster
scene and abruptly speeds away, perhaps to the other Bay Area cleanup unloading site at
Hunters Point.
A couple of "Command Center" trailers had awning-covered check-in desks manned by bored
attendants. Two Hazardous Materials safety inspectors in white hard hats and official jackets
walked about, stopping now and again to gaze at nothing in particular. A virtual truck
dealership of shiny new white Ford pickups, flatbeds and vans took up 30 or so parking
spaces.
Babcock shifted on his feet, weaving first this way and then that as wary boxers do.
Behind him, a small conference room was packed cheek-to-jowl with at least a dozen men
mostly in short-sleeve shirts, some standing, the rest hunched over a table laden with papers.
They looked busy, too, but a couple of them couln't resist peeking out to see why Babcock is
fidgeting.
It seemed to occur to Babcock that he couldn't grant an interview anyway, even if he wanted
to — and had the time. He announced, "The JIC has prohibited all interviews that don't clear
through them." He sidestepped quickly away and disappeared, a boxer rushing to a neutral
corner after a knockdown.
"JIC' stands for Joint Incident Command, in this case at Treasure Island. It is a child of
Homeland Security Directive-5 from President George W. Bush. It commanded the Secretary
of Homeland Security "to develop and administer a National Incident Management System
(NIMS)."
The object is "to provide a consistent nationwide template to enable all government, private-
sector, and nongovernmental organizations to work together during domestic incidents." The
JIC came into being June 5, 2006, and generally is seen as a response to the devastation of
New Orleans and many other Gulf Coast areas by Hurricane Katrina.
Also at Treasure Island is where top U.S. Coast Guard brass have offices, and who were
famously visited Nov. 10-11 by the Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Thad W. Allen.
Following that whirlwind fly-in, a Congressional committee was hurriedly informed of cleanup
operations by Rear Admiral Craig E. Bone, Coast Guard Director of Inspection and Compliance.
He told them that all blame for the mess rests entirely with operators of the container ship.
Soon after the spill, the JIC announced that about 27 percent of the spilled oil (16,000 gallons)
had been siphoned up off the Bay. But the rest has washed ashore in globs and long gooey
strands at beaches both in the Bay and along the coast.
NRC Environmental Services has a branch right here in Alameda as well as others at Long
Beach, San Diego, Portland, Oregon and Seattle. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of National
Response Corporation, which has corporate headquarters in New York City, with six regional
offices scattered from Texas to San Juan, Puerto Rico. It handles large-scale emergencies such
as this world-wide.
Rescue workers recently had recovered 2,278 birds, some 1,255 of them dead, though not all
were killed by oil.
Larry, the security guard at a nearby ship who would not give his surname, was skeptical. He
said he's not alone out there at the Point in questioning all the great expenditures of money,
energy and time.
"In the end," he says with jaundiced wisdom, "all this will mean almost nothing and it will
really be Mother Nature who takes care of the cleanup. She always does."
Plan for marine reserves includes wide discussion
http://www.theworldlink.com/articles/2007/11/29/news/doc474f195f107ab880458199.prt
By Susan Chambers, Staff Writer
NORTH BEND - The governor’s office would like to see all Oregonians become involved in the
nomination process for marine reserves.
That was just one of the messages Gov. Ted Kulongoski’s Natural Resources Policy Advisor,
Jessica Hamilton, brought to the Bay Area Chamber of Commerce Independent Business
Operators luncheon at The Mill Casino-Hotel on Wednesday.
There are a number of increasing threats to the ocean, Hamilton said, and establishing off-limits
areas of the ocean, marine reserves, would be one way to guard against threats such as
unknown impacts of wave energy, potential aquaculture and climate change.
“There are things happening out there that we should be prepared for,” Hamilton said.
Hamilton said the idea of marine reserves is not new. The Ocean Policy Advisory Council has
been working on them for at least seven years, under both Gov. John Kitzhaber and Kulongoski.
Marine reserves has been a hot-button issue for most of those years, with ocean users the most
vocal and involved in the process. Commercial fishermen, sport fishermen, ports and marine-
related businesses have a vested interest in the issue. Many are concerned the set-aside areas
could translate into lower revenue or business closure.
“If there were marine reserves right out in front of Charleston, I would take a hit,” said Marjorie
Whitmer, owner of Betty Kay Charters in Charleston.
“That’s certainly not the intent of the governor,” Hamilton said, noting that Kulongoski has said he
would welcome fewer than 10 reserves and would be designed to have very little or no
socioeconomic impact.
Kulongoski’s plan calls for a public nomination process in early 2008 in which all Oregonians can
suggest marine reserve sites. So far, the issue has been discussed primarily at OPAC meetings
— that’s the official public forum for these issues, Hamilton said — but eventually, the whole state
would be able to have a say.
Hamilton said it’s the governor’s hope that coastal communities also may be able to take pride in
their local marine reserves and help enforce the use and non-use of the areas. So far, the primary
dialogue has been with the fishing industry.
However, at various OPAC meetings, several representatives of environmental groups from state
and national groups have urged council members to keep moving forward in the reserves
process.
“It’s important that folks on the coast work with all of the community, not just the crabbers, salmon
fishermen or charter boats,” Hamilton said.
Nonetheless, of the 60 or so people attending the luncheon, it was only those from marine-related
businesses or organizations and sport and commercial fishermen who asked questions such as
the cost of implementing the reserves, enforcement and how a few sites in Oregon can compare
to larger sites in Washington and California. Representatives from businesses that have a lesser
relationship with ocean use were silent.
Coos Bay-North Bend Rotary member Andy Nasburg commented on a Rotary meeting held in
July in which Oregon Coastal Zone Management Association Executive Director Onno Husing
discussed the reserves process. At that meeting, Nasburg said, Rotary members found out that
fishermen have adjusted their fishing methods and management so that some fish stocks have
greater protection and that the ocean ecosystem isn’t as affected by fishing gear.
“Sometimes people on shore don’t recognize that,” Nasburg said.
“Yes,” Hamilton said, agreeing that fishing methods have changed. “But it’s not just about fishing.
It’s also about protecting a place.”
Hamilton equated marine reserves to set-aside areas on land in which there is no extractive
activities such as logging.
Sport fisherman Lou Leberti said that even in those wilderness areas, people often are still
allowed to hunt and use the area.
“I see you making a picture like that to inland people,” Leberti said, but, he added, it’s worth
noting that much of the nearshore coastal ocean already is protected about half the time — by
weather. The ocean often is inaccessible due to storms.
“It’s a scary, scary process you’re pointing at the coast,” he said.
The Ocean Policy Advisory Council will continue to discuss marine reserves at its meeting today
and Friday in Gold Beach.
(Susan Chambers covers fisheries issues for The World. She can be contacted by calling 269-
1222, ext. 273; or by e-mail at schambers@theworldlink.com.)
Oil spill fuels debate in ship industry
By SCOTT LINDLAW
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/printer2/index.asp?ploc=b&refer=http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110ap_
bay_spill_pilots.html
OAKLAND, Calif. -- Eric Robinson stepped onto the bridge of the container ship
Horizon Pacific and peered at a computer monitor depicting San Francisco Bay. Ship
icons blipped clearly in the virtual water, but the meaning of some of the other symbols
was murky.
Robinson, a San Francisco ship pilot, makes his living guiding supertankers, naval
vessels and cruise ships through the bay's treacherous waters, and his job is to adapt
quickly. But he never knows what electronic navigation gear he will face when he takes
the helm. And he thinks that should change.
The government, the International Maritime Organization and the shipping industry are
exploring how to bring some order to the jumble of electronic navigation aids
proliferating on the seas - a movement that has been given greater impetus by an accident
in San Francisco Bay earlier this month.
On Nov. 7, a 901-foot container ship sideswiped the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge,
gashing its hull and dumping 58,000 gallons of sludge-like bunker fuel. It was the bay's
worst oil spill in nearly two decades and closed fishing in the bay for more than three
weeks; authorities lifted the ban Thursday after determining there is no significant health
risk from eating seafood caught in areas affected by the spill.
While the cause of the accident is still under investigation, the pilot in that episode told
authorities there was confusion between him and the ship's captain over symbols on an
electronic charting system while the vessel Cosco Busan made its way through a fog
bank.
"An international standardization of bridge equipment like radars and electronic
navigation equipment - to me, that would be the legislation I would like to see come out
of this," Robinson said during an interview as he set a course for Hawaii.
As the sun set over the Port of Oakland two weeks after the spill, and cranes loaded
containers aboard, Robinson carefully reviewed the electronic charting system with the
ship's captain.
"You want to make sure you're looking at what you think you're looking at," Robinson
said.
Such a thorough briefing is not always possible in the high-pressure world of
international shipping, where captain and pilot are often from different countries, as was
the case aboard the Cosco Busan.
The National Transportation Safety Board and the Coast Guard are looking into the
possibility of miscommunication, perhaps even a language barrier, in the Nov. 7 incident.
The Cosco Busan's pilot also said his two radar displays became distorted.
The nation's 1,100 state-licensed pilots frequently board vessels out at sea for the last part
of the inbound journey. Out there, the pilot is often confronted with busy shipping lanes,
heavy radio traffic and poor visibility or darkness.
Robinson said fiddling with equipment in those moments is the last thing he wants to do.
"I've seen at least a dozen different electronic charts and dozens of radar displays,"
Robinson said. "Bridge markings, buoy markings, depth contour curves, what
measurements the depths are in, whether they're in fathoms, feet or meters - basically
every aspect of the chart other than the outlay of the land could be different."
Some pilots, frustrated by the varying systems, have begun carrying their own laptops
loaded with familiar charting software onto the ships, he said. The laptops can be plugged
into the ship's navigation equipment.
Robinson is eager to see a new system in which a pilot could hit a button that would
prompt the electronic charts to revert to a "standard mode," or default setting, that would
be uniform across all manufacturers and show charts with standard symbols.
Many proponents of this system argue that "technology may be getting out in front and
changing faster than mariners can keep up with it," said Paul G. Kirchner, executive
director and general counsel of the American Pilots' Association. Kirchner emphasized he
does not believe pilots necessarily need such a system, because they receive such
extensive training.
Nevertheless, the pilots association is studying the standard mode approach. "We think
there's value" in this approach, Kirchner said.
Robinson's primary tools of the trade are his eyes, and during his run aboard the Horizon
Pacific, he referred to the electronic charts only occasionally. It was dark but clear by the
time the container ship was fully loaded with Christmas trees, Army weapons cartridges,
ice cream, wine and cars.
But when fog, haze or rain close in, pilots turn to radar and the electronic charts. The
Horizon Pacific was equipped with a sophisticated electronic charting program called
Coastal Explorer. A desktop computer ran software that flashed real-time data about the
ship and others in the area, as well as hazards, depths, buoys, bridges and docks.
The Cosco Busan had similar gear. In its report on the incident, expected out next year,
the NTSB will look at the role navigational aids played, and at the differences in symbols
between charting systems across the industry, board spokesman Peter Knudson said. The
board sometimes recommends policy changes.
The International Maritime Organization, the U.N. body that regulates the global
shipping industry, is studying the issue of standardizing the devices and the symbols they
use, Kirchner said.
One possible hurdle would be in getting manufacturers to agree on uniform standards
when several have invested a great deal of money in proprietary systems, said Chris
Philips, editor of Pacific Maritime Magazine.
"It's hard for the Coast Guard to say, `Throw all your equipment away and buy from this
guy,'" Philips said.