Press Releases
Monday 1st March 2010
AVOCA CREATES A WAVE OF UNFOUNDED, MISGUIDED FEARS
The Central Coast Artificial Reef Project (CCARP) would like to repudiate the misguided fears that are being fuelled by a minority of misguided and misinformed individuals in Avoca.
These people first claimed that the waves and wave action on Avoca Beach would be altered. “In the year 2001, Ccarp sought advice from a company that specialises in water hydraulics (wave actions, their cause and effect)”Sue Dengate said. “We sought to ensure that the selected site off Avoca was not going to impact on the shoreline or wave action. If the answers were detrimental we would have kept searching for another site” Said Sue Dengate.
When the Lands Department took over the project, they commissioned a thorough, independent water hydraulics analysis as part of the environmental assessment to confirm that the chosen site would have no impact in the waves and beach.
The protesters then claimed that there was some sort of conspiracy by the government trying to hide the Avoca site by saying it was Terrigal. “In the year 2000, Ccarp first began looking for suitable sites for a large warship to be sunk as an artificial reef, with very specific criteria to ensure that the vessel would sit upright and not interfere with either the water, or land. A short time later, after we had found the site off Avoca we launched our campaign at a public meeting at Ourimbah University to announce our plans, see if there were any issues and enlist support. I showed an aerial photo of Terrigal and Avoca with a superimposed ship off Avoca, outside the line from The Skillion to First Point. At this meeting we were overwhelmed by the level of public support” Said Dengate “Since conducting our initial surveys in 2000, we have always intended that the ship to be sunk off Avoca. We have never hidden this fact” Dengate said. “We, Ccarp chose to always say “Terrigal” because that is where the divers would have to go to board boats to get the artificial reef. The last thing that Avoca residents would want is tourists mistakenly coming to Avoca to go to the reef and then having to find their way to Terrigal. Now that would be a traffic snarl” Said Sue Dengate. “The Dept of Lands commissioned an independent organisation to produce a Site Selection Study in order to confirm that the site identified by Ccarp would meet all criteria. This is a comprehensive document produced by leaders in the field of Marine and Freshwater Studies and confirms the site identified by Ccarp” said Dengate
The protesters then claimed that the Adelaide would pollute Avoca Beach and the rock pool where their children play. “An independent company, expert it this field that has previously cleaned and stripped other Australian naval vessels for artificial reefs has been working on the Adelaide for months now to remove ALL pollutants. There is strict guidelines and legislation, ‘the Commonwealth Environmental Protection (Sea Dumping) Act 1981’, meeting international standards that must be adhered to. These standards ensure that no substances that may be harmful to the environment remain” Sue Dengate said. All PCBs, lead and other toxic materials will be removed. The Ex-HMAS ADELAIDE was one of the first ships to be painted by the Royal Australian Navy using an inert polymer based paint that will have no impact on the environment. All unknown wastes, antifreeze, coolants, batteries, halocarbons, components containing mercury, zinc anodes, uncoated copper cabling, cadmium, black or grey water, asbestos, radioactive materials have been removed.
The protesters have also claimed that sinking a vessel for an artificial reef is not allowed anywhere in the world, so why is Australia allowing it “There are at least 5 ships that were sunk as artificial reefs in Canadian waters prior to the year 2000 and many others in the US and UK. Australia now has the Ex HMAS Perth and Swan in WA, the Hobart
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