Oil spill near Pulau Pawai, Pulau Senang 4 Jan 12
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Jasmine Ng Business Times 5 Jan 12;
The Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) said on Thursday that 5 metric tonnes of marine fuel oil had spilled into the Strait of Singapore. However, traffic in the port and the Strait of Singapore remains unaffected.
The minor oil spill is caused by a collision between a Singapore-registered containership, Kota Tenaga, and a Malta-registered VLCC, SEEB. The collision occurred about 2.7km south of Pulau Sebarok on Wednesday night.
MPA said the spillage from Kota Tenaga was contained and Kota Tenaga was moved to Raffles Reserved Anchorage with an oil boom was laid around the vessel as a precaution.
A total of 12 craft was activated to monitor and clean up the oil spill. Non-toxic and biodegradable oil spill dispersants were used to break up patches of oil sighted in the vicinity of Pulau Pawai, Pulau Senang and Raffles Reserved Anchorage.
MPA said it is investigating the cause of the collision.
Minor oil spill in Straits of Singapore
AsiaOne 5 Jan 12;
A Singapore-registered container ship, Kota Tenaga, and a Malta-registered VLCC, SEEB collided at about 2.7km south of Pulau Sebarok yesterday, the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) said.
The accident occurred at about 9pm and saw about 5 metric tonnes of marine fuel oil spill into the sea.
An inter-agency effort coordinated by MPA was immediately activated to contain and clean up the oil spill.
MPA said the spillage of oil from Kota Tenaga has been contained, and Kota Tenaga has been moved to Raffles Reserved Anchorage.
An oil boom was laid around the vessel as a precaution. There were no reported injuries to crew members.
In addition, a total of 12 crafts were sent to monitor and clean up the oil spill.
Non-toxic and biodegradable oil spill dispersants were used to break up patches of oil sighted in the vicinity of Pulau Pawai, Pulau Senang and Raffles Reserved Anchorage.
MPA said it is monitoring the situation closely and will respond to any sightings of oil patches.
According to the port authority, traffic in the port and the Strait of Singapore remained unaffected.
The cause of the collision is currently under investigated.
Crash leads to minor oil spill off Singapore
Straits Times 6 Jan 11;
A SINGAPORE container ship collided with a Malta-registered ship on Wednesday night, causing about 5 tonnes of marine fuel to spill into the sea 10km off southern Singapore.
The Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) received a report on the incident on Wednesday night.
The accident - involving Singapore-registered vessel Kota Tenaga and Malta-registered ship SEEB - occurred 2.7km south of Pulau Sebarok, which lies just south-west of Sentosa.
The crew members did not sustain any injuries, said the MPA in a statement yesterday.
It also said that the spill has been contained with the help of non-toxic and biodegradable chemical dispersants. They were used to break up the patches of oil.
Oil patches were sighted in the vicinity of Pulau Pawai, Pulau Senang and the Raffles Reserve Anchorage.
The Kota Tenaga has since been moved to the Raffles Reserve Anchorage.
An oil boom has also been laid around the vessel as a precaution.
A total of 12 craft were deployed to monitor and clean up the oil spill.
The MPA said it continues to monitor the situation closely, and will respond to any sighting of oil patches.
Meanwhile, traffic in the port and the Strait of Singapore remains unaffected.
The MPA is investigating the cause of the collision.
In May 2010, another collision involving an oil tanker and a bulk carrier in the Singapore Strait dumped about 2,500 tonnes of crude oil into the sea off the Changi coast.
It prompted a week-long closure of a 10km stretch of the eastern shoreline.
KEZIA TOH
OTHER SPILLS
May 2010: An oil slick formed in the Singapore Strait when the MT Bunga Kelana 3 crude tanker collided with the MV Waily bulk carrier. The 2,500-tonne leak was enough to fill an Olympic-size swimming pool. Wednesday's spill is small compared with it.
October 1997: Singapore's worst oil spill occurred when the Cyprus-flagged Evoikos collided with the Thai-registered Orapin Global, leading to a leak of more than 29,000 tonnes of oil.
Minor oil spill following collision between Kota Tenaga and SEEB in the Strait of Singapore
MPA Press Release 5 Jan 12;
At about 2100hrs on 04 Jan 2012 (Singapore time), the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA) received a report that a Singapore-registered containership, Kota Tenaga and a Malta-registered VLCC, SEEB had collided at about 2.7km south of Pulau Sebarok.
The master of Kota Tenaga reported that about 5 metric tonnes of marine fuel oil had spilled into the sea.��An inter-agency effort, coordinated by MPA, was immediately activated to contain and clean up the oil spill. The spillage of oil from Kota Tenaga was contained and Kota Tenaga was moved to Raffles Reserved Anchorage. An oil boom was laid around the vessel as a precaution. There is no report of injury to crew members.
A total of 12 craft was activated to monitor and clean up the oil spill. Non-toxic and biodegradable oil spill dispersants were used to break up patches of oil sighted in the vicinity of Pulau Pawai, Pulau Senang and Raffles Reserved Anchorage.
MPA continues to monitor the situation closely and will respond to any sighting of oil patches.
Traffic in the port and the Strait of Singapore remains unaffected.
MPA is investigating the cause of the collision.
ISSUED BY THE MARITIME AND PORT AUTHORITY OF SINGAPORE (MPA)
For clarification, please contact:
Ms Evelyn Lim
MPA media hotline: (65) 8366-2294
Email: Evelyn_Lim@mpa.gov.sg
More links on wild shores of singapore
Ulma Haryanto Jakarta Globe 4 Jan 12;
The recent government relocation of hundreds of long-tailed macaques from Gunungkidul, Yogyakarta, to a breeding facility in Tangerang, Banten, has raised the hackles of animal welfare watchdogs.
“Hundreds of wild monkeys have been trapped in Gunungkidul and shipped by truck to Tangerang to a primate dealer who supplies the international research industry, in particular laboratories in the USA and Japan,” Sarah Kite, director of special projects at British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, told the Jakarta Globe.
BUAV is a London-based group that campaigns for an end to lab experiments using animals.
A truck carrying 64 macaques arrived on Tuesday at a shelter owned by CV Universal Fauna in Pasir Riab, and at least 109 more are expected in coming days.
“We are very concerned about the plight of these monkeys, their capture from the wild and removal from their home and family groups, their transportation for many hours on the back of a truck to Jakarta and their final destination,” Kite said.
Legal trade
Previous investigations carried out by BUAV in Indonesia have heightened concerns about the trade in primates. It was found that the exported animals were being used in lab experiments.
Under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites), which Indonesia ratified in 1978, the long-tailed macaque is classified under Appendix II, which means that while it is “not necessarily now threatened with extinction, [it] may become so unless trade in specimens of such species is subject to strict regulation.”
Since 1989, the Forestry Ministry has forbidden the export of wild-caught macaques; only those bred at breeding centers can be exported. But a special permit for catching the wild animals and breeding them can be obtained.
Every year the Ministry also determines a quota for the capture of wild species within the country. In 2008, for long-tailed macaques, the quota was 5,100.
“This figure included 3,000 monkeys for the Indonesian research company Bio Farma — a vaccine and serum manufacturer in Indonesia — and 2,000 monkeys to replace breeding stock at primate supply companies, after consultation with regional forestry offices,” a BUAV report says.
Bio Farma is listed as a client of CV Universal Fauna. On its Web site, CV Universal Fauna states that it has been exporting the animals since 1987. It boasts a capacity of “producing” 3,000 monkeys per year and cites clientele from the United States and Japan.
Plight of the monkeys
Information on what happens to specific primates at their final destination is difficult to obtain, but BUAV said it tracked down a number of institutions that have imported primates from Indonesia, including Wake Forest University in North Carolina.
“The experiments involved ethanol consumption and its effect on the body or behavior. This was often combined with removal of the ovaries or feeding the animals a diet that would cause fatty deposits in blood vessels as part of the study,” the report says, adding that in some studies all the animals were killed or died.
One of the companies, SNBL USA, uses the animals in experiments in “reproductive toxicology, safety pharmacology, immunotoxicology and carcinogenicity.”
“The BUAV is opposed to all animal experiments,” Kite said. “There are strong ethical and scientific arguments against using primates in research.”
“[And] not only are international animal welfare guidelines being violated,” she added, “but Indonesia is also breaching its own legislation as well as failing to comply with Cites.”
A ‘service’ to the government
Herman Riyadi, director of development at Universal Fauna, said this was the first time the company had received wild monkeys from the government.
“This is our CSR [corporate social responsibility]. We don’t charge the government anything for taking in the monkeys,” Herman said, adding that wild monkeys cost more since they have to be vaccinated for various diseases. “Besides, we already have our own monkeys that we breed in captivity.”
Sulis, an officer at Yogyakarta’s Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BKSDA) confirmed the captures, adding that the long-tailed macaques have been “disturbing ... and causing trouble for the community.”
A press statement from the office, dated Dec. 20, said that the Gunungkidul Forestry Office had asked for BKSDA Yogyakarta in July to “actively participate” in “countering the attacks of the long-tailed macaques,” which are considered state property.
Pramudya Harzani, director of the Jakarta Animal Aid Network, questioned the decision made by BKSDA Yogyakarta, since the long-tailed macaques do not usually disturb human habitat.
“The agency failed to look at the root cause, which is the diminishing habitat for the monkeys, especially after the Mount Merapi eruption destroyed hectares of forest,” Pramudya said.
He added that in other regions, humans and the long-tailed monkeys are able to live side-by-side as long as there is enough vegetation for both species.
“In Karimun Jawa, the villagers plant guava trees in the outskirts of their villages for the monkeys,” Pramudya said.
“Our other concern is that Indonesia does not have a record of how many long-tailed macaques are left in the wild,” Pramudya continued.
“With unorganized exploitations and cases where the monkeys are viewed as pests and captured, it is harder to find out.”
Concern as Indonesian Monkeys Relocated to Research Breeding Center
Ulma Haryanto Jakarta Globe 4 Jan 12;
The Indonesian government's recent relocation of hundreds of long-tailed macaques from Gunungkidul, Yogyakarta, to a breeding facility in Tangerang, Banten, has raised the hackles of animal welfare watchdogs.
“Hundreds of wild monkeys have been trapped in Gunungkidul and shipped by truck to Tangerang to a primate dealer who supplies the international research industry, in particular laboratories in the USA and Japan,” Sarah Kite, director of special projects at British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection, told the Jakarta Globe.
BUAV is a London-based group that campaigns for an end to lab experiments using animals.
A truck carrying 64 macaques arrived on Tuesday at a shelter owned by CV Universal Fauna in Pasir Riab, and at least 109 more are expected in coming days.
“We are very concerned about the plight of these monkeys, their capture from the wild and removal from their home and family groups, their transportation for many hours on the back of a truck to Jakarta and their final destination,” Kite said.
Legal trade
Previous investigations carried out by BUAV in Indonesia have heightened concerns about the trade in primates. It was found that the exported animals were being used in lab experiments.
Under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites), which Indonesia ratified in 1978, the long-tailed macaque is classified under Appendix II, which means that while it is “not necessarily now threatened with extinction, [it] may become so unless trade in specimens of such species is subject to strict regulation.”
Since 1989, the Forestry Ministry has forbidden the export of wild-caught macaques; only those bred at breeding centers can be exported. But a special permit for catching the wild animals and breeding them can be obtained.
Every year the Ministry also determines a quota for the capture of wild species within the country. In 2008, for long-tailed macaques, the quota was 5,100.
“This figure included 3,000 monkeys for the Indonesian research company Bio Farma — a vaccine and serum manufacturer in Indonesia — and 2,000 monkeys to replace breeding stock at primate supply companies, after consultation with regional forestry offices,” a BUAV report says.
Bio Farma is listed as a client of CV Universal Fauna. On its Web site, CV Universal Fauna states that it has been exporting the animals since 1987. It boasts a capacity of “producing” 3,000 monkeys per year and cites clientele from the United States and Japan.
Plight of the monkeys
Information on what happens to specific primates at their final destination is difficult to obtain, but BUAV said it tracked down a number of institutions that have imported primates from Indonesia, including Wake Forest University in North Carolina.
“The experiments involved ethanol consumption and its effect on the body or behavior. This was often combined with removal of the ovaries or feeding the animals a diet that would cause fatty deposits in blood vessels as part of the study,” the report says, adding that in some studies all the animals were killed or died.
One of the companies, SNBL USA, uses the animals in experiments in “reproductive toxicology, safety pharmacology, immunotoxicology and carcinogenicity.”
“The BUAV is opposed to all animal experiments,” Kite said. “There are strong ethical and scientific arguments against using primates in research.”
“[And] not only are international animal welfare guidelines being violated,” she added, “but Indonesia is also breaching its own legislation as well as failing to comply with Cites.”
A ‘service’ to the government
Herman Riyadi, director of development at Universal Fauna, said this was the first time the company had received wild monkeys from the government.
“This is our CSR [corporate social responsibility]. We don’t charge the government anything for taking in the monkeys,” Herman said, adding that wild monkeys cost more since they have to be vaccinated for various diseases. “Besides, we already have our own monkeys that we breed in captivity.”
Sulis, an officer at Yogyakarta’s Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BKSDA) confirmed the captures, adding that the long-tailed macaques have been “disturbing ... and causing trouble for the community.”
A press statement from the office, dated Dec. 20, said that the Gunungkidul Forestry Office had asked for BKSDA Yogyakarta in July to “actively participate” in “countering the attacks of the long-tailed macaques,” which are considered state property.
Pramudya Harzani, director of the Jakarta Animal Aid Network, questioned the decision made by BKSDA Yogyakarta, since the long-tailed macaques do not usually disturb human habitat.
“The agency failed to look at the root cause, which is the diminishing habitat for the monkeys, especially after the Mount Merapi eruption destroyed hectares of forest,” Pramudya said.
He added that in other regions, humans and the long-tailed monkeys are able to live side-by-side as long as there is enough vegetation for both species.
“In Karimun Jawa, the villagers plant guava trees in the outskirts of their villages for the monkeys,” Pramudya said.
“Our other concern is that Indonesia does not have a record of how many long-tailed macaques are left in the wild,” Pramudya continued.
“With unorganized exploitations and cases where the monkeys are viewed as pests and captured, it is harder to find out.”
Teresa Cerojano Associated Press Google News 5 Jan 12;
MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Philippine authorities have seized large shipments of anteater and turtle parts in a sign that the illegal trade in the endangered animals is booming, officials said Wednesday.
Fifty-eight pounds (26.5 kilograms) of Philippine pangolin, or anteater, about to be smuggled to Manila as goat meat was confiscated Wednesday at the Puerto Princesa city airport in southwestern Palawan province, said Alex Marcaida, an environment official.
On Monday, 209 pounds (95 kilograms) of pangolin scales and 200 pounds (90.5 kilograms) of scutes from endangered hawksbill and green turtles were seized at the same airport, he said. That shipment, which had a market value of nearly 1 million pesos ($23,000), was declared as dried fish.
Pangolin is a Chinese delicacy. Its scales are used in Chinese traditional medicine.
Turtle scutes — the plates that cover the shells — are used to decorate guitars and other products.
Marcaida said it's possible traders are increasingly turning their attention to Palawan, home to many exotic wildlife, for pangolin meat because the animal's population has been vanishing in other parts of Southeast Asia due to hunting and deforestation.
The International Union of Conservation of Nature said rising demand for pangolins, mostly from mainland China, and lax laws are wiping out the unique toothless anteaters from their forest habitat in Southeast Asia.
The animals are protected by laws in many Asian nations, and an international ban on their trade has been in effect since 2002. But these measures have had little impact on the illicit trade, the IUCN said.
The IUCN lists the Philippine pangolin, which is endemic to Palawan, as close to becoming a threatened species.
But Marcaida, who is from the government's Palawan Council for Sustainable Development, said the Philippines considers the mammal a threatened species because of the continuing illegal trade.
He said the strict monitoring of trading in live pangolin may have prompted traders to try to smuggle them as meat and scales. A kilogram (2.2 pounds) of pangolin scales sells for 5,000 pesos ($114).
The same traders may be behind the two shipments, Marcaida said, adding that no arrests have been made and the investigation is ongoing.
The shipper of Wednesday's haul left the cargo with an airport porter, while Monday's shipment, which was bound for central Cebu city, went through a courier company, he said.
AFP Yahoo News 5 Jan 11;
A seven-pronged starfish, a mysterious pale octopus and a new kind of yeti crab are among a teeming community of previously undiscovered life on the sea floor near Antarctica, British researchers said.
The species, described this week on the online journal PloS Biology, were first glimpsed in 2010 when researchers lowered a robotic vehicle to explore the East Scotia Ridge deep beneath the Southern Ocean, between Antarctica and the tip of South America.
The dark and remote area is home to hydrothermal vents, which are deep-sea springs that spew liquid at temperatures of up to 382 degrees Celsius (720 Fahrenheit), and have previously been found to host unusual life forms in other parts of the world.
"Hydrothermal vents are home to animals found nowhere else on the planet that get their energy not from the Sun but from breaking down chemicals, such as hydrogen sulphide," said lead researcher Alex Rogers of Oxford University.
"The first survey of these particular vents, in the Southern Ocean near Antarctica, has revealed a hot, dark, 'lost world' in which whole communities of previously unknown marine organisms thrive."
Hydrothermal vents were first discovered in 1977 off the Galapagos Islands.
The latest discoveries 2,400-2,600 meters deep include several new types of sea anemones, stalked barnacles and unidentified octopi, and a new kind of starfish that was observed feeding on the fauna around the vents.
A new type of blond, furry-legged yeti crab, a species formally known as Kiwa hirsuta which was first seen at hydrothermal vents in the South Pacific in 2005, was also found to have different DNA than those already known to man.
Fish were uncommon, and only seen on the peripheries of the hot zones.
Researchers were equally intrigued by what they did not find -- including many of the giant worms, vent mussels, crabs, clams and shrimp that have been found before at other deep sea vents in the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian Oceans.
The differences in species suggest that the geographic conditions of the area may make it a distinct province for certain forms of life, which have been unable to migrate to other parts of the globe's sea floor.
"These findings are yet more evidence of the precious diversity to be found throughout the world's oceans," said Rogers.
"Everywhere we look, whether it is in the sunlit coral reefs of tropical waters or these Antarctic vents shrouded in eternal darkness, we find unique ecosystems that we need to understand and protect."
Researchers on the project came from the University of Oxford, University of Southampton and the British Antarctic Survey. Their research appears online in the January 3 issue of PLoS Biology.
AFP Yahoo News 5 Jan 12;
Harp seal pups off the coast of eastern Canada are dying at alarming rates due to a loss of winter ice cover, according to US scientists who questioned on Wednesday if the population will be able to recover.
The study by researchers at Duke University shows that seasonal ice cover in the harp seal breeding regions of the North Atlantic Ocean has declined about six percent per decade since 1979, when satellite data began.
The result has been entire generations of newly born seal pups dying due to their disappearing habitat, said the study published in the open access science journal PLoS ONE.
"The kind of mortality we're seeing in eastern Canada is dramatic," said co-author David Johnston, a research scientist at the Duke University Marine Lab.
"Entire year-classes may be disappearing from the population in low ice years -- essentially all of the pups die," he said. "It calls into question the resilience of the population."
For recent data, researchers looked at satellite images of winter ice from 1992 to 2010 in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, a prime breeding region off the east coast of Canada, and compared them to yearly reports of dead seal pup strandings in the region.
They also compared stranding rates to records of a climate phenomenon known as the North Atlantic Oscillation, which controls the intensity and track of westerly winds and storms and exerts a major influence on sea ice formation.
They found that years of weaker NAO and lighter ice cover showed higher death rates among seal pups.
While harp seals have adapted to the earlier spring melts in recent years by developing shorter 12-day nursing periods, it remains unclear if their population can sustain itself against sea ices losses over time.
"As a species, they're well suited to deal with natural short-term shifts in climate, but our research suggests they may not be well adapted to absorb the effects of short-term variability combined with longer-term climate change and other human influences such as hunting and by-catch," Johnston said.
The team also looked back at data from 1950 to 1972 which showed that NAO weather changes were tied to big declines in the seal population, followed by period of recovery from 1973 to 2000.
"But there's a caveat: regardless of NAO conditions, our models show that sea ice cover in all harp seal breeding regions in the North Atlantic have been declining by as much as six percent a decade over the study period," added Johnston.
"The losses in bad years outweigh the gains in good years."
Wynne Parry, LiveScience 4 Jan 12;
As climate change progresses, the planet may lose more plant and animal species than predicted, a new modeling study suggests.
This is because current predictions overlook two important factors: the differences in how quickly species relocate and competition among species, according to the researchers, led by Mark Urban, an ecologist at the University of Connecticut.
Already evidence suggests that species have begun to migrate out of ranges made inhospitable by climate change and into newly hospitable territory.
"We have really sophisticated meteorological models for predicting climate change," Urban said in a statement. "But in real life, animals move around, they compete, they parasitize each other and they eat each other. The majority of our predictions don't include these important interactions."
These are important because some species may not be able to move fast enough to survive, or they may have to compete with new species or species better able to adapt to the shifts during and after the move.
To test how competition and variation in dispersal ability would affect species' success at shifting to new habitats when faced with climate change, Urban and his colleagues created a mathematical model.
The researchers found that diversity decreased when they took these factors into account, and that new communities of organisms, which do not exist today, emerged.
Not surprisingly, the results favored organisms that could tolerate a wider range of habitats and were well equipped to move when necessary. Meanwhile, species with small ranges, specific needs and difficulty dispersing lost out.
Overall, competition slowed everyone down in the pursuit of habitat; however, the strongest dispersers were able to overcome this and displace others, the researchers found.
"It's not about how fast you can move, but how fast you move relative to your competitors," Urban said.
"The species that face the greatest extinction risks might not be limited to those that disperse less than climate change absolutely requires, but also those that disperse poorly relative to their warm-adapted competitors," they write in a study published in the Jan. 4 online edition of the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
LiveScience.com Yahoo News 5 Jan 12;
From devastating earthquakes to record tornado outbreaks, 2011 was the most expensive year for natural disasters worldwide, according to a new insurance report.
At $380 billion, global economic losses from natural disasters in 2011 were two-thirds higher than in 2005, the previous record year, which had losses of $220 billion.
The magnitude 9.0 Japan temblor in Marchalone caused more than half the year's losses, according to the report from global insurance firm Munich Re. In the United States, a deadly dozen disasters each caused more than $1 billion in damage.
While 90 percent of the recorded natural catastrophes were weather-related, the big earthquakes were the most expensive disasters,. Normally, it is the weather-related disasters that account for the greatest insured losses, according to the insurance firm. Over the last three decades, geophysical events such as earthquakes accounted for less than 10 percent of insured losses, Munich Re said.
Around 70 percent of economic losses in 2011 occurred in Asia, where 16,000 people were killed in Japan during the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. Even without considering the consequences of a crippled nuclear reactor in Fukushima following the quake, the economic losses caused by the quake and the tsunami came to $210 billion — the costliest natural catastrophe of all time.
The magnitude 6.3 earthquake in Christchurch, New Zealand, in February caused $16 billion in damage. Other expensive disasters included tornado season in the United States, which caused $46 billion in damage. Hurricane Irene, the first hurricane to make landfall in the United States in three years, caused $15 billion in damage.
"Thankfully, a sequence of severe natural catastrophes like last year's is a very rare occurrence," said Torsten Jeworrek, the Munich Re board member responsible for global reinsurance business, in a statement.
Some 27,000 people died in natural catastrophes in 2011. This figure does not include the countless deaths from famine following the worst drought in decades on the Horn of Africa, which was the greatest humanitarian catastrophe of the year.
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