26 July 2010

End of the voyage of the Plastiki

Back on 21 March 2010, I wrote about the Plastiki setting sail from San Francisco to Sydney to raise awareness about maritime pollution. This morning, the Plastiki sailed into Sydney Harbour. From press release
After sailing more than 8,000 nautical miles and spending 128 days crossing the Pacific, the world’s largest ocean, in a boat made of 12,500 plastic PET bottles, the Plastiki expedition and her crew have safely and successfully reached their planned destination of Sydney to cheers of welcome and support.

Arriving at Sydney Heads at 11.10am local time with a 12knot south south easterly breeze, the Plastiki triumphantly sailed into Sydney Harbour to cheers of welcome and support from a small spectator flotilla. The historic expedition was completed in four legs : San Francisco – Kiribati ‐ Western Samoa ‐ New Caledonia before reaching the Australian Coast (Mooloolaba) on Monday 19 July and continuing on to Sydney.

“It’s an incredible feeling to finally arrive in Sydney. We had great faith in the design and construction of Plastiki and while many people doubted we’d make it, we have proved that a boat made from plastic bottles can stand up to the harsh conditions of the Pacific.” expedition leader, David de Rothschild said.

De Rothschild, 31 from the United Kingdom, paid tribute to his fellow adventurers, Jo Royle (Skipper), David Thomson (Co‐Skipper), Graham Hill (Founder of Treehugger.com), Olav Heyerdahl, Matthew Grey, Luca Babini (Photographer), Vern Moen (Myoo Media Film maker), Max Jourdan and Singeli Agnew (National Geographic Film makers) for their skill and commitment during the voyage.

“Jo and the rest of the crew did a remarkable job sailing the Plastiki safely across the Pacific and it is due to their collective efforts that we’ve been able to raise global awareness of the issue of plastic waste in the world’s oceans.

If there’s waste, it’s badly designed in the first place, and we need to start taking a serious look at the way we produce and design every product we use in our lives,” De Rothschild said.
Read more. According to the Plastiki blog, Sydneysiders are also able to visit the craft
The Plastiki will be moored at Australian National Maritime Museum, Darling Harbour for a month and will be open to visitors on Sunday August 1st, so if you weren’t able to make it down today then you’ve still got a chance to explore this one of a kind plastic bottle boat. Keep an eye out for the more information by following us on Facebook and Twitter.
Photos from Getty (Brendon Thorne) via PicApp

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - JULY 26: British adventurer and environmentalist David de Rothschild sails as the 'Plastiki' arrives at Sydney Harbour, completing the 12,860 kilometre journey from San Francisco to raise environmental awareness on July 26, 2010 in Sydney, Australia. The 60-foot catamaran made from 12,500 plastic bottles was designed by Australian Andrew Dovall and embarked on the 128 day journey to bring attention to condition of our oceans and the amount of plastic debris in the Pacific. (Photo by Brendon Thorne/Getty Images)

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - JULY 26: British adventurer and environmentalist David de Rothschild sails as the 'Plastiki' arrives at Sydney Harbour, completing the 12,860 kilometre journey from San Francisco to raise environmental awareness on July 26, 2010 in Sydney, Australia. The 60-foot catamaran made from 12,500 plastic bottles was designed by Australian Andrew Dovall and embarked on the 128 day journey to bring attention to condition of our oceans and the amount of plastic debris in the Pacific. (Photo by Brendon Thorne/Getty Images)

See also
- Sydney Morning Herald (has video)
- NPR
- United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)

Posted by at
Labels: ,

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)