A Cure to Guimaras Oil Spill

MANILA, Philippines -- Seven months after a sunken tanker caused a major oil spill in the Philippine, the tanker spilled some of its cargo of 2 million liters (500,000 gallons) of industrial fuel oil off the central island of Guimaras, damaging marine reserves and affecting about 26,000 people who depend on fishing.

Desperate attempts were made to contain the oil in the province, known for beach resorts and a pristine marine environment. The oil recovery is run by Sonsub, an Italian company specializing in deep-water operations.

Since the disaster, the company has embarked on a major public-relations exercise while paying for the cleanup.

Weeks after the August 11 sinking, authorities collected cast-off clippings of human hair from salon owners and volunteers, then put it in permeable sacks and used them as improvised booms to mop up the oil.

* Because of mismanagement of the cargo ship and overloading of the cargo itself, oil spill in Guimaras happened. It may not clearly stated among which party is entirely responsible, it is clearly seen that the ocean of Guimaras is aching from the damage that oil spill may cause not only for now but also in the near future.

It takes a lot of time before the wounds of the Guimaras Ocean totally heals. Much effort are exerted by the authority to clean this mess, they ask help from expert in different countries. High end technologies are used by them but none of them gives immediate cure to ease the pain the Guimaras Ocean are feeling. The authority asks and asks opinions on how to siphon the remaining oil from the tanker.

The Philippines may have low-tech with regards to technology but the finishing touch that ease the pain our nature (Guimaras Ocean) feels are the human hairs donated and collected from different persons and establishment like parlor and salon. Human hairs may seem useless for us but it proves its worth in this tragedy.

Not all things that seem to be useless are totally useless, its just we didn’t perceive to see its real worth like what the human hair does in Guimaras.


Reference: Remaining oil siphoned off from the sunken tanker in Guimaras
First posted 19:05:51 (Mla time) 2007-03-16 associated Press