Top Talent at MUA Surf comp

Date: 13 July 2001

Surfers, seafarers & Greenpeace mark 10th anniversary of Kirki shipping disaster with oily protest

Surfing legend Australian longboard champion Wayne Deane will be competing at the Whalebone Classic surf riding competition at Cottesloe, WA, tomorrow, alongside other top talent including four times state champion Chris Fullston.

Greenpeace, the MUA and the International Transport Workers' Federation are sponsoring the competition under the banner safer ships, cleaner seas.

The event will kick off at 10am with MUA seafarer and surfer Cai Wernblom covering himself in 'oil' to show the world how a shipping disaster would impact on our beaches.

"It's great to see the union backing this event," said champion surf rider Wayne Deane. "One of the reasons I'm here is because I'm an environmentalist. It's shocking the way they let some of these foreign ships run down. You know they are going to go down at any time. It's almost as if you have to shock people into realising what's happening."

Chris Fullston, state champion and Margaret River Classic winner still remembers when the Kirki broke up: "I was a professional fishermen at the time and it threatened my livelihood. I've surfed overseas in oceans polluted by crude oil spills. You get black goo all over your board like tar. The union campaign is really a good thing for the environment."

The Kirki broke up in 1991 and almost wiped out every beach and cray fishing area for hundreds of miles. This year alone there's been around a dozen major shipping disasters including the Jessica in Galapagos island reserve in January,the Kristal off Spain in February and the Xana off the Greek coast in May. And let's not forget the near miss with the Bunga Teratai Satu on our Great Barrier Reef last November.

"Yet the Federal Government is opening up our coast to more and more of these substandard ships and inviting just such a disaster, here," said MUA spokesperson Wally Pritchard.

Wayne Deane and Chris Fullston will be available for interviews on the day or on 08 92842815 today.

For further information: Wally Pritchard, MUA branch deputy secretary (08) 9335-0510 (mobile) 0419 903 618 or James Courtney, Greenpeace (mobile) 0418 927821

For further information

Contact:	Zoe Reynolds
Union:	Maritime Union of Australia
Phone:	0417 229873
WWW:	http://mua.tcp.net.au/

LaborNET is proudly created, designed and programmed
by Social Change Online for the Labor Council of NSW
[Credits] [Site Matters]